Valentine's Day!

We celebrated Valentine's Day this Friday.  Chris and I trade off the two romantic holidays, Valentine's and our Anniversary (thanks for the idea Stacy and Lindsey).  This Valentine's Day I was in charge.  Here was the plan...

First Stop - The Melting Pot

Neither of us had ever been there, but we are big fans of fondue.  We took advantage of a coupon and ordered "The Big Night Out."  That means we had the whole shebang - cheese fondue, salad, meat and oil fondue, and last but not least, dessert chocolate fondue.  Dessert was by far our favorite.  It was soooo good!  We got a fondue made of white chocolate, cinnamon and bananas.  At first, it didn't sound amazing, but the waiter recommended it so we ordered.  And man was he right!!  It was amazing.  I would definitely recommend going there for dessert.  The rest of the meal was only okay, but dessert...amazing!

Next Stop - the Jazz Game

Not the most romantic idea, I guess, but I thought it was make my hubby happy.  He loves few things more than basketball (one of those things is me, of course).   The Jazz were playing Oklahoma, number one in the West.  We put up a good fight during the first half, but lost it in the third quarter.  We were up in the nosebleeds, but it was really fun to enjoy the atmosphere and support the Jazz.

Final Stop - Home Sweet Home!
I got the hubby an awesome Valentine's Day card that made both of us laugh.  The night ended with some Hersey's kisses and a good snuggle.   Happy Valentine's Day everyone!  Hope you had a good time, where ever you are!

Quote of the month: "It is a curious thought, but it is only when you see people looking ridiculous that you realize just how much you love them."
~Agatha Christie

Amen, sista!

The Practical Life

Yesterday, Chris was making a model of cyclobutane with his organic molecular model set.  Exciting, eh?  Well it was pretty exciting!  Chris got to deal with me acting like a five-year old and asking a million "why" questions.  Why does this one have a double bond?  Why do carbons have to have four bonds?  Why isn't the set more colorful? etc, atd.  Soon, however, all of the science mumbo-jumbo made me weary and I fell asleep on the couch.

And how was I awakened?  With a lovely organic molecular massage.  Have you ever seen those little wooden massagers that are made of round balls and have the smiley faces on them?  That is a little bit like what Chris's molecule looked like and he was trying it out as a massager.  It worked pretty well!  



And who said science wasn't practical?

New Haircut!

As per Stacy's request, I have added a few pictures of my new haircut.  I have had the same haircut for about four years now.  It was time for a change!!  But, as I'm kindof a scardy-cat, I started with a very small change. Bangs! :)  I'm liking them so far.  What do you think?

Just a quick update.  Chris and I had a fun Saturday today.  After a morning of a much needed apartment cleaning, we headed up to Park City to return a Christmas present and do a little shopping.  We came back home just to make a mess again in our clean apartment.  

I had made pulled pork a few days ago so we decided to try and make Cafe Rio salads.  We gathered all the ingredients for the famous cilantro ranch.  We pile our tortillas high with pork, black beans, lettuce, tomatoes, sour cream, and of course the cilantro ranch salad dressing.  If I do say so myself, it was pretty good!                                                                                                         We also love to make homemade pizza.  I've learned to make Amanda's recipe for pizza dough and we love piling on the toppings.  However, most of the time we like different toppings.  So, Chris creates a Meat Supreme side, while I have my Margarita.  We like to try new things and I'm slowly trying to develop the cooking skills of my mom and mother-in-law.

Linds also asked me to put up a few pictures of my apartment.  It is starting to come together and really beginning to feel like home.  Chris and I have lived here for about two months and have made a few improvements. :)  

We are in a basement apartment so it can get a little dark.  We recently bought this floor lamp to give a little light.  And I love it!  I think it adds a little detail to the room.

This is our little corner.  Yes, those are fake plants because I cannot keep a plant alive for the life of me.  I also love the brown flowers I made out of paper sacks.  If you want to learn how, click here.

This is our bedroom.  We still have some decorating to do here, but I love our bed!

And here is our little kitchen.  It is pretty small, but we are making everything fit pretty well.  (Please ignore the dishes on the counter.  At least they're clean! :)

 

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And here is our new tablecloth.  It is sooo cute and adds a lot to our kitchen. 

t'was the night after christmas...

All of the festivities are over and we finally have time to take a breath and look around to count our blessings.  We have truly been blessed this year.  Chris and I were able to spend our first Christmas with both our families as we live so close to both of them (right in between the two, in fact). 

Our Christmas Eve morning was spent at Christopher’s house with a little trip down memory lane.  Chris remembers making homemade taffy every year with his family, that is until his mother decided that it was too messy and just wasn’t worth it.  We got her to give in this year, however, pulling the “new in-law” trick.  “Mom, Kara has never pulled taffy before,” Christopher pleaded.  And it worked.  We each got our own glob of taffy to flavor, color and pull.  I chose cinnamon, my favorite taffy flavor, while Chris chose banana.  Other flavors included black licorice, peppermint, coconut-almond, root beer, and lemon.  The taffy is made of…well, sugar - corn syrup, caro, and more sugar.  Once it is boiling hot you pour some onto a buttered plate and let it cool off a little.  Not too much, though, or the taffy will start to harden.  So we all braved the hot blob and started pulling.  The taffy did not turn out exactly as we had thought.  Some of it was more of a hard candy to suck on rather than chewy taffy.  But we had a lot of fun anyway.

Christmas Eve we spent with my family, enjoying the Lee family traditions.  One of those also included a trip down memory lane, although I can’t say that it ended as well as Christopher’s nostalgic journey in time.  My trip down memory lane included watching Christmas Eve on Sesame Street.  I remember loving that movie, watching as Big Bird tried to find out how a plump Santa Clause got down a skinny chimney.  However, about twenty years later, it just didn’t seem to have the same effect.  J  It was fun anyway, to laugh at the sometimes silly things we hold dear.  The evening progressed with a big family Christmas dinner of ham, steak, yummy potatoes, salad, mom’s rolls, and of course, Martinelli’s.  After dinner we all settled into the living room to listen to dad read the Christmas story.  This year, we sang a few Christmas carols as well to make the story come alive.  Then, mom handed out cards to each of us so we could write our “gifts to Jesus.”  Each year we write something that we would like to give to Christ which usually means a spiritual goal we would like to accomplish or something that we can work on to be more Christ-like, as our will is the only thing we can truly give to Christ which He hasn’t already given to us. 

Once that was over, it was time to put out the cookies for Santa and send the kids to bed.   I got to help my brother play Santa as we set up a new pink and purple bike for his daughter, Reese.  The rest of the night was spent playing games, watching movies, and finally sleeping. 

The best part, however, was Christmas morning.  And I’m not talking about opening presents.  No, my Christmas morning started about 6:15am.  That is when Chris started tossing and turning.  Finally, at 6:30 he sat up and said, “Aren’t there children in this house?  Why aren’t they awake and screaming?!  It’s Christmas!!”  Yes, Christopher was the first one awake, even before the four year old.  He even made sure to go to the bathroom a few times, sneeze loudly, and constantly talk to me in hopes of waking up the children.  And finally, about 6:45, they did wake up.  Christ sat up straight as a fence post when he heard the first whimper from the one-year old.  Yes!  Finally!  When we were all awake and had brushed our teeth, we marched upstairs to the excess that awaited upstairs.  Boy, was our cup overflowing.  We all opened presents and enjoyed the general splendor.  And man, did Chris spoil me.  He is so thoughtful and kind and thought of all the presents that I needed even if I didn’t think of them.  My favorite present, however, was a small one that came in a big package.  And when I say big, I mean very, very large!  This present, which was about the size of a pair of glasses, was wrapped in box upon box and layer upon layer.  One layer was tin foil (a whole roll!), another was cellophane, another duct tape.  Boy was it a joy to open. J  Inside the last box (which happened to be a glasses case) were two tickets to the Broadway musical Wicked!  I have never seen the play but I am in love with the music.  What a perfect surprise!  Thanks you Chris!! (And thanks to Dad who did so well at keeping it a secret.J)   I got Chris a new Fossil watch that, I must say, looks very good on him. 

We had a great Christmas as we celebrated with family and friends.  However, it was also a great time to reflect upon and commemorate the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ.  It is our Savior who fulfilled the Plan of Salvation and made it possible to return to our Heavenly Father and live with our families forever.

God Bless!

The Ying-Yang factor

So, it has been a long time since we have posted anything, so, to you reader, thank you for sticking around. Or if you just stumbled upon the blog, thank you for reading. It is nice to have someone there to hear your thoughts and your desires; your hopes and dreams; the subtle yearnings of your heart. I think this is the real reason why we blog. We just want to write down everything somewhere, and even if it is just a little snippet, we want someone to read it and connect with us. To see what we are going through and say, "I have been there", or "I can relate". I mean, it is basically the exact opposite of those journals all the girls had in 7th grade with the little locks on the cover. Similarly it is where you confide a lot of the things you may not talk about with people face to face, but unlike those, it is the place where you don't want to keep things under lock and key. You can let things out there, and hope that even though you can't bring yourself to say them aloud, that someone will read them, know about them. To be honest, writing on the blog has never made me want to keep a journal more. Because even though I want so badly to just let everything out, I realize there are still conversations which are better left between ourselves.
So here you have found us (Kara and I), well, at least the part of us which wishes to be discovered. The side of us which is excited to be seen, and heard, and shared. This is our chapter. (I shy away from saying our story, or book. Those seem so big, and organized. Something I attribute more to our parents. We are just getting started, with the little bit of wisdom, and love we have for eachother.) Here is what we think, what we feel, what we yearn for, and who we are...

A funny thing happened on the way to the game park.....

I forgot to write about one of the funniest experiences of the honeymoon. We were happily enjoying the little petting zoo when we discovered some of the more ferocious animals were kept a little deeper within the park. A white tiger named Bejal was kept in a cage in the far right corner of the park that had the most shade. 


Naturally, we wanted to take some pictures by the tiger. I went first and then we switched places to take Chris’s picture. I was messing around with the settings on the camera, needing to make a few adjustments. As I was jiggering the camera, Chris started bouncing impatiently on the chain-wire fence. When I lifted the camera and looked through the lens, I could see the tiger, and more importantly, the look in the tiger’s eyes. His shoulders had started to hunch as he looked angrily as the man’s behind who was so obnoxiously disrupting his afternoon nap. I saw his muscles tense as the tiger slowly, stealthily, started towards Christopher. I couldn’t believe what I was about to see! The tiger was going to pounce and I was going to lose my husband of three days! 


“Er…argh…Chris!!” I stammered as I struggled to find the words to warn my husband. I think the look in my eyes warned him more than anything and he began to move as the tiger charged. I squealed as the tiger ran straight for the fence then turned sharply before actually touching it. At my squeal Christopher half ran, half stumbled to my side. 


I breathed a sigh of relief. Chris had narrowly escaped the clutches of a vicious white tiger! And then came the laughter that so often accompanies adrenaline-rushing experiences. We doubled over, realizing what had just happened. I couldn’t believe the tiger had wanted to attack! We looked closer and saw that there was an electric fence right before the wire fence protecting the park patrons. 


And...since we are still in our twenties and still mildly immature, we had to try it again! I think Chris braved the fence about five times, and each time the tiger attacked. I tried to do it once, but the tiger only glared at me. He didn’t attack, apparently not that threatened by a small female. I suppose he could sense that Chris was another alpha male challenging his territory. Every time we passed by the cage, even if we didn’t touch the fence, the tiger would follow Christopher menacingly with his eyes, daring him to try it again. 


I don’t think these pictures capture the full ferocity of the tiger’s gaze, but I hope it gives you a taste of the mischievous fun that we had!