+3

Many of you know Jonny and I have a habit of finding abandoned animals. Well, we have added 3 more to our rescue list. Jonny was on campus today to do homework and found these three adorable babies.

They were found about 20 feet from where we found Boston and Tokyo. So we decided to keep up the name theme, Olympic cities to be more specific. So meet...

Athens (female)

Torino (female)

And Rio (male)

We think they were probably about 3-4 weeks old. They still had trouble walking and couldn't retract their claws yet. They were adorable. We found a shelter in Murray that was able to take them in so we dropped them off. So that is +3 to our rescue tally. I think we are sitting around 15-20 now.

Also, a side note...

I found a red umbrella! The color here doesn't do it justice. It is much brighter and I love it.

Cabbage and Kielbasa

Last week one of our meals for the week was a favorite of Jonny's family: cabbage and kielbasa. It was delicious. We thought we would share the recipe. You need a box of the multicolored rotini, a large head of cabbage, a pound of polska kielbasa, butter, salt, and pepper. You start by cooking the pasta (just using the box directions.)

While the pasta is cooking cut up the cabbage. It should be "bite sized" pieces. Put this into a skillet with 2 tablespoons melted butter. Cook over medium heat. It needs to be stirred often but keep it covered when not stirring. This keeps the moisture in the cabbage. While the cabbage is cooking cut up the kielbasa. Cut off the ends of the kielbasa. To save time cut the kielbasa in half, length wise, then into half circles. They should be about half a cm thick or less.

Once the cabbage has become tender and has become slightly translucent it is time to mix all the ingredients together.

When all the ingredients are mixed together add more butter (up to 4 tablespoons, but it just depends on how much you like.) At this point you add 1/2 a teaspoon of salt and pepper to taste. DO NOT add the salt before this point. If you add the salt to the cabbage too early it will suck out the moisture. That is it. Serve and enjoy!

Is it Spring?

You would think after five years of living in Provo I would be used to the weather. I'm not. We had a few days of gorgeous weather. Sunny, blue skies, short sleeves, wonderful. However, it goes from being sunny and nice one day to cold and rainy/snowy the next. Actually, it goes from being nice and sunny one hour to cold and rainy the next hour. I went to work the other day in short sleeves with the cool air on because it was so warm. On the way home, I had the heater on and was wishing I had a coat. We watched the weather go from sunny, to extremely windy, to overcast and snowing. At one point it was sunny and snowing. Pretty much I am done with this weather. I am ready for summer. I am ready for sunny days and the pool. But, I have decided that I still have at least a month of this crazy incorporative weather, and based on the past I can almost guarantee a snow storm, so to make it better... I want a big red umbrella. I just feel like they are cheerful and it would make me happy on a rainy (or snowy) day.

(pic)

Doesn't it just seem happier? Plus, I have my cute boy to keep me company under the umbrella! There is just something cool about them.

(pic)

So the search is on for a big red umbrella!

You thought they were done

You guessed it BIRTHDAY #4! Monday is Katie's golden birthday, 22 on the 22nd! So Jessica (who lived with Katie and I before she got married and has been Katie's friend for forever) threw her a surprise party. We had a gathering of old roommates/friends. It was so much fun! We haven't all been together in so long. We had Carol and her hubby Nick, Kasey, her hubby Garrett, and their baby Kailyn, Jess and her hubby Steve, me and Jonny and the guest of honor KATIE! We had BBQ (which was delicious!) and played games and Rock Band.

The boy band!

And their adoring fans!

We were also entertained by watching Kailyn pull the cutest faces. Like this one!

How cute is she? Also, I held her for awhile and she didn't cry! I was so happy. Babies always cry when they are placed in my hands. She was just content to let me hold her and chew on my fingers. Kasey, I love your baby! She is adorable!

Then we had cake and ice cream and Katie opened her presents.

Showing off her yummy cake by Jess.

Presents!

Katie just got into nursing school at the UofU. A nice little birthday present! So Jess and Steve got her this present so she could practice.

The stethoscope really works! It was such a good evening. I'm glad that we all got together to celebrate with Katie and to just see each other again.

I think this might be one of the best group pictures ever! My friends are pretty.

Childhood Favorites

This post is inspired by a conversation that I had with my dad today concerning my favorite book as a child. This got me thinking about all of my favorite books as a child.

Over the past few years a few of my favorite children's books have been changed into movies. Starting with...

I loved this book when I was little. The pictures were amazing and the story was great. I was excited when I first found out about the movie. However, the movie kind of creeped me out. There animated characters seemed too real and the hobo on the train was kind of scary.

The graphics were impressive but it was weird. I also didn't like how much they added to make it a movie.

The next was...

Again, great book. One of my favorites. Again, I was excited for the movie but after the previews came out I got a little nervous. Probably one of the weirdest movies I have ever seen.

The boy and the wild things had some serious issues. Max doesn't even end up "where the wild things are" in the same way. I also felt like I was missing something the entire time.

The final book to movie...

The town of Chew and Swallow. I actually liked this movie. I thought it was cute. But it is still so different. I mean the book didn't have a clumsy inventor who made water into food. In the book the weather just is food. Also amazing to me, the color difference. Compare the book cover to the movie...

Ok now to the real point of this post. My all time favorite children's book. It will likely never be made into a movie but it was my favorite growing up and I will read it to my kids and to their kids.

For those of you who don't know this story it is about Ferdinand the bull. He loves to sit under a tree and smell the wildflowers. Through a series of events this peaceful bull finds himself the "star" of a bullfight. I don't know why I loved this book so much. The pictures have little to no color and I feel like color pictures is a big draw to little kids. I guess the story just got me.

My dad called me this evening said he thought of me because my mom had just purchased this book for a little boy. My dad read the book and had a little laugh remembering how much I loved it. Apparently it was in the movie Blind Side which makes me happy. If you have not read this book READ IT! It will take five minutes and it will make you happy. I need to find a copy to have for my kids. I'm almost positive my childhood copy is still on the bookshelf in my room at home.

St. Patrick's Day!

I don't know why but I love St. Patrick's Day. I just think it is fun- dressing in green, eating corned beef and cabbage. This year I was working until 6 so I wasn't sure how I was going to make the corned beef. I found a recipe to make it in the crock pot. I was a little nervous but it worked out really well. I just realized that I totally forgot to cook the cabbage! I'm not sure that anyone else would be sad about not having cabbage but I am. At least I had potatoes and carrots that were cooked with it. Ashley made rolls that were delicious. It was a very good meal. I am happy it turned out well.

Karleigh and Kirstin in their St. Patty's Day green!

Ashley and I

Jonny cutting the corned beef.

Jonny and I relaxing after a big meal.

Hope everyone had a great St. Patrick's Day! Now I can look forward to corned beef leftovers. Maybe I'll remember to make cabbage to go with leftovers!

My Man's Birthday!

Birthday number three... Jonny! Jonny's birthday was on Friday. I had to work in the morning but had the rest of the day off. I had decided to attempt a 14-layer cake for his birthday cake. I got the recipe from Bakerella (found here.) I was really nervous about it working and tasting good. Luckily I had Karleigh to help me. Thank you to her I wouldn't be able to do it alone. Unfortunately, Jonny had an Econ test and Stats homework to do on his birthday, but at least that kept him occupied while I baked. Basically you make a massive amount of batter (it barely fit in my biggest bowl) and then scoop it into 14 pie tins.

We baked for at a time and it is only 12 mins each so it didn't take too long.

Then you make the chocolate icing. This was the scary part for me I was worried I would scorch it or something. At one point it almost boiled over. And then you start stacking and stacking and stacking, layering icing in between. No they are not pancakes.

Now according to the recipe the picture below is what it looks like done but like Bakerella I didn't like the look so I added frosting.

Jonny took a break from school work and we went out to dinner with Kirstin. Then we came back to my place and Katie came over for presents and cake.

He got clothes from my parents and me, an N64 game from Katie and a game from Kirstin. Kirstin and I had fun wrapping her present to him. We used three different wrapping papers and went around it 3 times with each. Showing off all the paper and his present.

Then time for cake. I couldn't wait for him to cut into it! He gets his wish!

And here it is, 14-layers...

It actually worked! It tasted good too! None of us could even finish a piece though!

On Saturday we went to dinner with a bunch of his cousins. I had texted them all the week before to get them together for a birthday dinner. We went to Rumbi at The Gateway. It was so much fun! I think we were done with dinner after about 30 mins but we we hung out talking for like 3 hours.

I think overall he had a pretty good birthday. One year older and wiser!

Birthday

Number two in the March birthday line-up. I had a very fun birthday thanks to my family and friends. I went to P.F. Chang's for dinner with Jonny, Karleigh and Kirstin. (Thank you Dad and Mom!) It was delicious as always.

So quick story. My grandpa always puts the bows on his head when he opens presents. So we have started doing that as well. On Karleigh's birthday she was putting them on and put one on around her head and then moved it to a headband. But I thought it looked really cute going around the head so I wore it to dinner on my birthday!

Then we went to Karleigh's place for presents and cake. I got lots of great stuff including circle cake pans from Karleigh! Is it weird that I am so excited about them?

The cake was delicious! Karleigh made a two layer chocolate cake. The bottom layer had chocolate chips baked in, the top layer had Andes mint chips baked in. Then the middle was hot fudge instead of frosting. It had cream cheese frosting and chocolate drizzled on top. Also, the candles were black and white and adorable.

I wish my Mom, Dad, Taryn and Grant could have been there to celebrate too but they sent their love from afar! It was a good birthday. Thanks to everyone who helped make it special.