You Know You're Married/Boring/Easily Excited When...

...things like this make you smile like it was your birthday.
I wish I was joking, but I'm completely serious. This beautiful piece of laundry-drying brilliance replaced the following POS that I was happy to leave for Mr. Garbage Man last week. Happy enough to take a picture. 
I won't go into all of the scary details as to how the above piece of fire wood ended up on my bad side (believe me, Jay was right there with me on this), but I will tell you where I got my new one that I just L-O-V-E. Ikea. Of course. Here is a link in case you want one too. It may not make you as happy as it made me, but it sure will get your laundry dry!

A Night with Legends...and a cup (or 10) of Coffee

This past Thursday night, Jay and I attended Elton John & Billy Joel's "Face to Face" concert with Jeff and Tara. The four of us along with Kiera, Joe, Krista and her friend Erin enjoyed an early dinner at Oreganos before heading downtown for the show. All I can say is that the show was AMAZING. If you have the opportunity to attend, I strongly recommend you do! Both Elton & Billy (yes, we're on a first name basis now) performed beautifully both together and on their own - for a continuous three and a half hours! Here are some photos from the night:



On a completely different note, my husband seems to have acquired a new collection in the quest for the perfect Mexican coffee. Our favorite so far is from Sunflower market and reminds us of our honeymoon in Playa del Carmen. The others, not so much. Check out what is taking up some serious real estate in our freezer nowadays.
And since we are on the topic of coffee, I just had to post this pic that I took a couple weeks ago. It made me giggle when I came home from work one day.  Jay had some serious ingenuity when looking for something to close up the coffee bag. Rubber bands? No. Tape? No way. Bobby Pin? Perfect! Love him :)

Weekend Update: A Drive Up North

We just returned from a fantastic weekend in Flagstaff! Jay, Ryan and I headed up north after I got out of work on Friday afternoon. It was a beautiful drive! Jeff, Tara, Kathy (Jeff's mom), and Alistair were waiting for us when we got there. 

Here is the A-Frame cabin that we stayed in. It was super cute and conveniently located to lots of hiking, lakes, and downtown Flagstaff. Notice the snow! It was patchy here and there, but nonetheless nice to see!

Friday night, Jeff and Tara made delicious chicken and steak fajitas for dinner after which we enjoyed some beer, wine, and a seriously competitive game of Taboo! I hate to admit it, but the boys did kick the girls butts. Kathy, Tara and I swear they got the easy ones...

Saturday morning, we had a delicious Jay-made breakfast of eggs, sausage, and coffee. It was just enough fuel for a geocaching hike. Geocaching is an interesting adventure where you find GPS coordinates for "caches" ahead of time on this website. Then you take your GPS (which Jeff & Tara recently received as an anniversary gift) along with you on the hike and go find the cache. This photograph was from the beginning of our hike - Humphrey's Peak (11,500 feet) is in the distance.

The cache we were looking for was in 2 parts. Here is the location of the first cache. Can you see it? 

There it is! Inside we found coordinates to the final cache that we dialed in to the GPS and moved on.

It was such a nice day for a hike! 

After over 30 minutes of all six of us wandering around in the location of the final cache and unable to find it, it FINALLY caught Ryan and Jeff's eye at the same time. There was even a clue that we completely overlooked. "Bark up the Tree" - we thought it was talking about the tree bark when it ended up being a dog tag placed on this broken branch. Next time, we might not take geocaching so literally!

Alistair was along for the ride! I think he had a great time!

Jay acting "normal" in this picture after my request for him not to make a funny face :)

After the hike we took naps, read books, and played ping pong. I had prepared and frozen lasagna a few days prior so it was a really easy dinner Saturday night. I just popped it in the oven! I had never done this before, but am happy to know that it works! 

Sunday we headed to Upper Lake Mary for a picnic lunch and some fishing. It was super windy, but we had this nice little fence to sit against that blocked some of the wind.

Alistair looked so cozy in his seat! If only they had something like this for adults...wait, is that the Snuggie?! Maybe I'll pass...

No bites...

My handsome husband soaking up the sunshine! 

After packing up our bags, we had a quick ping pong tournament at the Rec Center. I think consensus is that Ryan was the one to beat with Tara in a close second :) Jay, Ryan and I spent a little time in Flagstaff before heading home while Jeff, Tara, Kathy and Alistair drove down to Sedona for some family pictures.

It was a great trip with great friends!

Weekend Update: Colorado

Jay and I left Friday night for Colorado to visit with the Davis family. As we usually do, we spent Friday night with Shawn & Juvy in downtown Denver. It was really nice to see them! Unfortunately our flight was delayed and didn't get in until 10:30...so our plans to meet up with my friend Brandi were cancelled and we just went to Shawn's loft for some catching up before heading to bed. Saturday morning, we enjoyed breakfast at Pete's (I had the gyro breakfast sandwich which was fabulous!) and then headed down to Castle Rock to see the family.

The twins were eating lunch when we arrived. I was so happy to see that they were sporting their "X" and "L" onesies that I made them for their birthday! Guess who's who :)

They are getting so big and have wonderful personalities! Xander babbles up a storm and Liam's smiles and giggles are contagious! They are not quite walking but are very close. More than anything, they had fun crawling all over grandma and grandpa Davis' house with it's nice and open floor plan! There were lots of fun things to explore down at floor-level. I especially loved watching Liam with the door spring:

Liam and the Spring from Amie Davis on Vimeo.

Saturday afternoon we visited the park. It was beautiful outside and nice to get some fresh mountain air!

Saturday night, we went to the Old Stone Church restaurant for dinner while Mary babysat the boys (who were sleeping when we left). It was such a nice time catching up over drinks, delicious food, and great company. The restaurant was an old church built in 1888, so the architecture was beautiful - stained glass windows, exposed stone, and cozy furnishings. We all left happy and satiated!

Sunday we spent the day relaxing at home. Todd, Karen, Mary and I took a walk with Liam and Xander around the neighborhood. It was nice enough to be outside with just a long sleeved shirt and no coat!

It was sad to leave after such a short visit, but we are looking forward to seeing everyone again in June for Kyle & Becca's wedding in Kansas City.

Weekend Update

Another beautiful weekend in the desert! The orange blossoms are blooming and the air is sweet and warm. I took this photo in our backyard on Saturday morning. I'm not sure what kind of flowers they are but they sure are vibrant! It was so sunny and bright outside that it took several minutes for my eyes to adjust after coming back in. 

Saturday night Jay and I visited with Kathy, Matt and their 4 boys for dinner and some catching up. They have a new beautiful home in the East valley that we were looking forward to checking out as well. We had a very nice welcome from the boys upon our arrival - here is a photo of 3/4 of them: Elijah, Timothy and Josh...

...and the other 1/4, Benjamin, was chilling out nearby. 

We had a very nice time talking about what we've all been up to, eating pizza and even squeezed in a little Wii time! I was surprised to find that Elijah had made me my very own Mii that was a pretty good look-alike! The twins were healthier, happier (beautiful smiles!) and bigger than the last time I saw them a few months ago. Thank you Kathy and Matt for having us over!

Today Jay and I took it easy. We enjoyed too many cups of coffee in our pajamas this morning, then this afternoon ran some errands, had a nice workout at the gym, and went out for a bite to eat before he headed to work. It's going to be another crazy work week for him, but we're both looking forward to spending this coming weekend relaxing in Colorado with the Davis family. 

I am Proud.

He works so hard.

I love him.

I am proud.

From our Kitchen: Budget Friendly and Healthy

It has been quite a while since I last posted "From our Kitchen" so I thought I'd write one in lieu of our normal "Weekend Update". It works out well because Jay and I did quite a bit of cooking this weekend. I'd also like to add that these recipes happen to be low cost AND pretty healthy!

Saturday night we were browsing our newest copy of Cooking Light and decided to try Balsamic Pork with Shallots for dinner. It was great because we already had everything in the house that we needed (yes, even the shallots believe it or not). Instead of pork tenderloin, we used pork chops which worked out quite well. It was delicious and is definitely something we will cook again. 

While Jay was chopping and sauteing the shallots, I decided to make Lemony Hummus and Fresh Whole Wheat Pitas. I knew we'd be spending some time at the pool on Sunday afternoon & that we'd want a yummy afternoon snack. Again, we had all the ingredients on hand, so it was very inexpensive to make and healthy too! Note for anyone wanting to make this at home: we did not have any bread flour, so thanks to Google I found that I could make it by adding 1tbsp. of gluten flour (yes, we actually happened to have some at home thanks to Jay) per cup of all-purpose flour. Both the pitas and the hummus were delicious and hit the spot after a few hours in the sun!

My yummy homemade pitas

Tonight, I made black bean soup for dinner. I love black beans and knew that we had everything we needed to put together a good batch. I tried this recipe and found it ok, but not fabulous. I found it a bit thick and therefore did not use the cornstarch. I also substituted carrots for red bell pepper and threw fresh cilantro on top for extra flavor. 

Black Bean Soup (Pre-Blend)

Of course after I ate tonight, I got a call from Jay asking about dinner (he's coming home at 10). I tell him about the soup and he nicely asks if I can blend it for him. I caved in & spiced it up a bit with some salsa which added a nice element. Next time I think I'll try blending more (but not all) and add some more spice to it. Or perhaps I'll try a new recipe :) 

During these scary economic times, I am grateful that Jay and I are able to keep our expenditures to a minimum when it comes to food. Yes, we still go out to eat a couple times a week, but when we are at home, we keep costs down with a few main tips:

1. Buy meat on sale and freeze it. Jay is awesome at spotting a good deal so when he comes home with several pounds of ground beef, pork, or chicken, we have a little assembly line to package it up into dinner-size servings in freezer bags. 

2. We write our "menu" out each Saturday or Sunday before going grocery shopping. We check out what meat is in the freezer and build our meals around that. 

3. We get our veggies at the local fruit/veggie stand (where prices are lower and produce is fresher) before we go to the grocery store. 

We save a lot of money each month by following these few rules and don't feel like we are sacrificing at all! The great thing about all the healthy meals and snacks is that I can justify eating desserts like this! Gotta go before it melts....