New Eats

Yesterday some friends of ours convinced us to join them for some Ethiopian food. It was our first time, and I do have to say I wasn't quite in the mood to try something new, but I'm glad we did! For some reason I thought the food would be bland, but it was actually quite the opposite.

I had delicious curried chicken {currently eating the left overs} and two other vegetable dishes that included chick peas and lentils, and other stuff, mixed to perfection to look similar to baby food. {Audrey and Noel, I now see how you were able to convince Mini Coop to eat it}. I also enjoyed the whole eating with your fingers thing with the bread-like (pancake-like?) stuff.

Not sure I would go as far as to say I would eat it on a regular basis, but I was pleasantly surprised, and would eat it again.

Yum.

I'm clearly so domestic.



My mom gave me a recipe that turned out delicious. I made one with, and one without chocolate chips, of course. {banana bread in case you couldn't tell}

In a land far, far away...

Once upon a time , I wrote this post. I never did end up finding/meeting Johnny Depp, I tried twice and barely missed him both times! Quite tragic, really.

Well, as the free movie tickets keep rolling in, we keep going. Yesterday we watched Pirates 4, and it was pretty good, nothing amazing; although I never get tired of checking out Captain Jack Sparrow...

It was fun to see the scenes of where we found the actual movie sets while in Hawaii. Sadly, I don't have any pictures of them {Bullocks? Maybe you have them all?}, but in the movie it's when they are in kinda a jungle-y area, and where all the small pools of water are, and where the mermaid is strapped and abandoned; righteous man tries to save the day and cheesy lines are exchanged.

Now, I kinda wished we would have taken the abandoned props like we wanted to, would have been cool, but oh well.

They need to stop making movies in Hawaii so that we don't get homesick for it as much. We're convinced though that we WILL go back to visit one day, and maybe even live there again for a little bit? Who knows; your guess is as good as mine.

Point and laugh

Shared by friend on facebook

I saw this picture and thought it was pretty funny. I can't believe that people actually believed that the world was going to end yesterday? I'm really curious how those people spent their day. For me, it was just another day. Although, I do have to say that the looting aspect of the event WAS kind of tempting {we do want a TV after all} but alas we didn't give in.

Hope you had a great weekend!

Close Call

Two days ago, Wolfgang and I had to use some services at the FedEx store, and as I went to go put my debit card in the little reader thing, I noticed my debit card was GONE. yes, gone. I was a little alarmed, but not freaking out; I figured it was probably at home somewhere. Well, I got side tracked and forgot about it {yeah, I know, something kinda important to forget about, right?} until I was in bed about ready to attempt to fall asleep. So I hurried outta bed and started searching....and searching...and Wolfgang even got up and looked in the car for me....nowhere to be found!

So I hurried and checked our bank account to see if someone had stolen it and was using it {they would be disappointed anyway, b/c they wouldn't get very far} and luckily the answer to that was No. Then, I remembered that earlier that same day that we went to FedEx, I had been there even earlier that day, and I specifically remembered taking my card out of the copy machine, but I didn't remember getting it out of the fax machine.

Crap.

I called FedEx, and they had it!! I was so relieved. So at midnight I go and get my card back- they even had it in their "vault!" Quality service I tell ya. I don't know whether or not a customer or an employee found it and returned it, but I'm so glad that there are still some honest people out there.

Make-over

In case you couldn't tell, I gave my blog a complete make-over.

Do you like it? It only took me about 80 years to A. make up my mind of what I wanted and B. put it all together, change colors, dimension, etc. {I'm not very good at this type of stuff} so that it will look the least amateur as possible.

You know, I have a lot of time on my hands, so what else am I going to do? It was kinda fun.

Hawaii Corner

Hawaii will always be a big part of our lives. It is the place where Wolfgang and I met, where we got engaged, and where we both graduated together with our Bachelors Degree from BYU-Hawaii.

Since our walls are quite bare, we decided to dedicate a section of our living room wall to Hawaii, by decorating it with some things we brought over when we moved. You can't really see the pictures very well, but they are the photography of the late Jon Mozo.

The bottom pictures isn't crooked as it looks here...

The top left hand picture can be seen better here and the bottom right picture can be found here (click the button "Click to enlarge" on the website). {except it doesn't say his name huge right in the middle of it}

One day we want to have a large canvas on our wall of one of his pictures :)

Surprise Date

Wolfgang took me on a "surprise date" probably about two weeks ago that I keep forgetting to blog about, but he keeps reminding me that I need to blog about it {I think he's pretty proud of the fact that he was able to surprise me with something}. SO, here I am!

It's actually really hard to surprise me, mainly because right now I'm always home when Wolfgang is, so it makes it hard for him to do anything without me knowing.

But lo and behold he was able to pull something off, because it happened at work. He was able to score some free ballet tickets from the concierge at work, so off we went!

The ballet was entitled, "Mosaik" and it was good {Wolfgang may have nodded off a couple of times though} and the theater it was held in was awesome! According to a cute "seasoned" usher, she said that it was the only historic theater that was preserved in the area.

I felt like I was at the Moulin Rouge!

There was also beautiful staircase but I didn't get a chance to take a picture of it b/c some hoochie mamas were having an usher do a photo shoot for them on it, so no such luck.

I hope to discover more fun places here in the valley in the coming months.

A few weekend thoughts

Yesterday we traveled north about 1 1/2 hours to go to a friend's wedding reception. It was so good to see her. She was one of the very first people I met in Hawaii, and from there we shared major classes and class projects. She's a great person and I highly value her friendship. I was so mad at myself, I brought my camera and forgot to take pictures! Rats.

Anyway, along that journey heading north on I-17, is always a treat for me. Yesterday evening it was, yet again, and it made me think, "The Phoenix pioneers must have had a lot of fun naming things around here." And this is why.

There is a:

"Happy Valley" (town)
"Bloody Basin"
"Horsethief Basin"
and this is a new one that I discovered,
"Big Bug Creek."

Isn't that great? I seriously wish I was around for all that fun and games.

2nd thought/ experience for the weekend {and on a completely different note}

Today in church, a native from Pakistan spoke in one of our meetings. He informed us that The Book of Mormon is currently being translated into a Pakistani language! {by him! and I'm sure others too.} I was so touched and moved by his incredible abbreviated story of how he fled from Pakistan to come to the United States. He didn't give specifics, but he left everything, including all of his family. I'm sure becoming a Christian for him was incredibly difficult, especially since in extreme cases in Muslim nations, you are killed if you convert to Christianity.

This just reminded me of how blessed I am to live in a country where I am free to chose what I want to believe, and can also worship freely; I definitely take that for granted. His bravery and love for the Gospel of Jesus Christ inspired me.

Us and the teenage drama girls.

I have a confession to make:

We are TOTALLY digging "American Idol" this season.

This is the first season that Wolfgang and I have ever gotten into this show, and it's quite addictive! It's so amazing how much talent there is out there {after you weed out the 2349872347 of crappy ones} And what amazes me even more, is that the majority of contestants are SO young! But in the words of Randy Jackson, "If you have it, you have it, it doesn't matter what age."

Anyway, so guess what? We are going to these guys:

In concert in July!

Yep, you better believe it. I logged on as soon as tickets went on sale.

Ok, yes, go ahead, laugh and judge all you want! But we are going to have a blast. :)

Contestants that we're most excited to see :

1) Casey Abrams, the "creative guy"
2) Scotty McCreery, my little girl crush
3) Paul McDonald, Wolfgang's crush {and mine too}

Contestant we are NOT excited to see: Stefano {don't care to find a photo of him...you can google him}

Don't even get me started with Stefano.


Bring on the fun and the obnoxious teenage drama girls! { "AHHH!! OMG!!! I LOVE YOU SCOTTY!!! oh wait...}

Movies

Wolfgang and I really like to watch movies, and have been on a movie kick lately.

Because of his mad skillz at work, Wolfgang has been getting an ample amount of free movie tickets through a selling incentive (a raise would be more favorable, but I guess this will do for now). So needless to say, we've been pretty up-to-date with recent movies.

One of my favorites so far, has been "Soul Surfer"


I'm not sure if we loved this so much because they filmed some of it at the beaches we use to go to regularly, or the fact that our friends are in it, or the fact it made us tear up a bit and had us home sick for Hawaii.

With that all aside, I think it is a really well done "feel good" movie that everyone can enjoy. So for anyone else that may have seen it, is it as good as I say it is? I'm curious if I'm just biased :)

Go see it!

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there, but most importantly, to MY mom!!

I'm grateful for her love, support, and sense of humor. She is the 'krazy glue' {no pun intended?...} that keeps our family together and {somewhat} sane.

I love you mom and am grateful for all that you have done, and continue to do, for our family.

Love,
The Favorite

Well, Hello.

She's back.

Family Weekend

This weekend we took at quick trip to Vegas to meet up with the fam and go to a family reunion for my mom's side. Usually reunions are thought of as painful and boring, but ours was enjoyable. Unfortunately pictures of the weekend were not taken with our camera, so no pictures of relatives and headstones for you.

A few thoughts and observations from the weekend:

-This was (I believe) the first time I had done this route to Vegas. For the first hour or so, I felt like we were heading to Mexico instead of Vegas.

-Peoria is the saddest town. Ugly, and it has more vacant buildings than my hometown. It also has a lot of random elderly people driving golf carts on public roads. Is that legal? weird.

-I forget how artistic graffiti can be

-INSIDE a hotel wall is no place for a cricket to live and to make his nightly music

-My mom's family doesn't mess around when it comes to potlucks (it was delicious)

-My talented aunt who was unable to attend made and sent several types of earrings to be used at the silent auction and for us to enjoy. They are little pomegranates; aren't they so cute? Pomegranates have historic and sentimental value in our family. -These baby booties were in the silent auction, made by a relative. I thought they were adorable and so did my mom, so she bought them for me. (who's the favorite now, Jess?) I think she might be hinting at something. Aren't they just the cutest thing?? We were glad that we were able to spend time with our family, it never gets old!