Cupcake Surprise & Popcorn and Pancakes

So last Friday I come home from a job interview to find Kyle holding two cupcakes with a note saying how much he loved me. I applied to this cupcake place the day before and he went in on Friday to buy some cupcakes, also telling them how his wife had come in the previous day to apply for the job and that he just had to come try it out - putting in a good word for me. Cutest surprise ever. And to top it off they were thee best cupcakes! The one on the left is apple with cream cheese frosting and the one on the right is just a rich chocolate. So good. I love my husband:) 

Dearest kettle corn lovers: this is the EASIEST and yummiest recipe for homemade kettle corn. 

1/3 cup popcorn kernels 

3 T sugar

3 T canola oil

salt

*So.. you pour the oil in a large pan and turn on med-high heat. While it is heating, mix the sugar and popcorn kernels in a bowl. WAIT UNTIL YOU SEE SMALL STREAMS OF SMOKE. This is important. You might need to stare at the bowl because it's kinda hard to tell. Once you see small puffs of smoke, pour the sugar and kernels in the oil and stir until mixed - only about 10 sec. Put the lid on and shake every direction then put back on burner. Do that every 10-20 sec until popcorn is completely popped. Immediately add salt to taste and stir to scoop off remaining sugar on bottom of pan. Serve:) 

 (This is half eaten already, a small amount of kernels makes a ton of popcorn)

Next on the list are these amazing Oatmeal Pancakes; thanks to Charlotte Rush from my home ward who gave me the recipe for my bridal shower. These are seriously to die for. Kyle and I actually ended up adding cinnamon, a pinch of nutmeg, and chocolate chips to them and they tasted like a breakfast cookie. In love.

1 1/2 c quick cooking oatmeal
2 cups milk
-Combine and soak 15 min
Add:
2 1/2 t baking powder
1 c flour (or wheat flour)
1 t salt
2 T sugar
Mix, then add:
3 T oil (or applesauce)
2 eggs
Mix together then pour on 300-350' griddle

 Question.. What do you do when your hubby gets tired of studying....?

MAKE QUICK PEACH PIE! yummmm

Another short and sweet of one of the easiest recipes. My family always makes this cause it takes a few seconds to throw together. Usually we use fresh apples cut up but we only had canned peaches - worked amazing though!

1-2 cups fruit (sliced apples, canned peaches, etc..)

3/4 cup sugar

1-2 T flour

2 shakes cinnamon

pinch of nutmeg

2 -3 T butter

*Mix all ingredients except butter in bowl and pour on top of prepared fruit in pie dish. Cut butter in pieces on top. Bake 375' 45-50 min (depending on fruit, just keep watch after 30 min or so)

Serve by itself or hot on ice cream yum!

1/2 cup oats

(OK so this is the before picture.. I meant to take an after picture but we ate it too fast.. oops! It looks great afterwards because the oats are softened and the butter mixed with them makes a nice caramelized coat. So easy and good.) 

Peach Days and Chick-Fil-A is NOT fun.

So I guess in Brigham City, UT they hold the record for the biggest parade in Utah each year - so it's a big deal, and lots of peach goodness! So Kyle and I went with Chad and Kynzie Kelley and Taylor and Tessa Brown to Peach days and it was great! We had fresh peach cobbler, walked around shops... oh, and rode the worst rides.. Ha ok they weren't that bad.. just about threw up each time.. great day

Never go on this ride..^

Love these guys!

So.. Let me explain something.. Anytime there is a Grand Opening of a new Chick-Fil-A, they pick 100 people to camp out in front of the building. Whoever stays the full 24 hours in the parking lot gets free Chick-Fil-A for a year! Yeah it's awesome.. Kyle did it last year and used all his coupons up in a few months.. Ha. So, we packed our camping stuff and left to the opening in Layton, UT at 3:30 in morning to sit in line. At 6am our names were put into a bag with another 250 people in which our names were not drawn.. Ok only part of that is true, they pick 100 people and 10 alternates who can choose to camp out so they can take someone's place if the break the rules or leave.. ha ha and Kyle was the 10th alternate they called: the last person they called. And he turned it down and we drove home:(

Waiting for them to call our ticket...

Our losing ticket...

I Heart Crafts

So I love anything that has to do with finding something in the dump and turning it into something. Last fall (before I was married).. I bought all new bedding and paint to redo my room. As for the decor, everything I found was purchased at Goodwill or the DI and spiced up:)

BEFORE

AFTER

(On the blank right wall I added a picture frame collage you will see in one of the pictures below.. Also, I wish I would have taken a final picture because at the point of each triangle I glued a big diamond stud on the wall. It looks way cool with them, just don't have the picture:(

In order to make the argyle wall, I had to measure the points of each triangle and then taped off what I would paint.

Most of these picture frames were found in the dump that I painted and spiced up. Great CHEAP way to decorate!

The Lamp....

I cut a long strip of material and sewed with a needle and thread back and forth in the middle of the fabric all the way across. Then pulled the string and scrunched up the fabric to make it have a laced effect. 

Then with hot glue (which is my FAVORITE craft tool. I use it with everything.) glued it around the base of a lamp shade.

 The Magnet Board....

So I found this magnet board which is about 2 1/2 x 4 ft at Goodwill for 7 bucks! The dark brown is wood and the light brown part is carpet.. ew. It was filled with dust and didn't have a back so I cleaned it and painted it white. Then bought a piece of sheet metal at Home Depo for $20. That was kinda pricey but they cut out the exact measurement for me and I kept the rest of the metal for other magnet boards.

Finished look!

I collected these bottle caps from when my family went out to eat and just hot glued magnets to the back I bought at Walmart. The diamond magnets however, were a little more pricey but so worth it. I got those at the Orange Patch home boutique in Mesa, AZ.

---------------------------------------------------

So in our current home in Logan I wanted a magnet board for our kitchen. I found thee ugliest bright pink magnet board at the DI in Provo, UT for way cheap and bought it:) I painted it black, then painted a stamp I had with two different kinds of paint - white and tan (slightly mixed). For the magnets I bought small circle mirrors from Michael's Art and Craft store and glued magnets to the backs of them...

Not bad?

French Toast DINNER & Shooting!

So, once again Kyle and I wanted to try out another recipe from my my recipe book Our Best Bites and it was a success! They are called Puffed French Toast. Completely unhealthy, basically a doughnut, and we felt sick.. but it was still great. Just don't eat alot.. 

*The BEST part about it all.. instead of adding the milk, we subbed it for Orange Juice. It gave it a great taste of just a hint of orange zest. If I were to make this again, I would DEFINITELY NOT deep fry it. Just cook it like you would french toast. The deep fry was a little too much.. TRY THE ORANGE!

http://www.ourbestbites.com/2008/05/puffed-french-toast/

The recipe even says to add vanilla ice cream on top as a dessert.. Kyle said it was way too unhealthy as a meal if you can just top it with ice cream for dessert.. so, to make it healthier, Kyle insisted on using Splenda instead of sugar and Cinnamon on the outside to make it healthier and he insisted I put that on the blog:)

He LOVED it. Breakfast for dinner mmhmm..

So Kyle decided to pick up a gun from his parent's house and bring it up to Logan. That's how we got to go shooting for our Family Night:) We set up cereal boxes, empty cans, and paper plates as targets. Pretty fun!

He was stoked about shooting.. Ha

Great Night!

Dinner for 2

I just have to brag for a minute about the WORLD'S BEST ROLLS I made the other day for dinner along with homemade soup. I found the recipe in a recipe book I got from my bridal shower called Our Best Bites.
                         

 It even says they're the best so I just had to try them out! Here is the link to the recipe:

http://www.ourbestbites.com/2009/10/worlds-best-dinner-rolls/

Also, along with these amazing rolls we made Cinnamon Honey Butter that is thee best thing ever! Here is their link:

http://www.ourbestbites.com/2008/05/honey-butter/

Just smother that on those hot rolls and it's the best thing you'll ever try!

So today was our ONE-MONTH ANIVERSARY!! So, to celebrate we made macadamian nut waffles for breakfast...

This is the best mix it is sooo good. They sell it in Hawaii but I found it at a World Market store oneday while shopping with my mom in Mesa, AZ. So I'm sure they sell it other places too. We just bought macadamian nuts and cut them on top of our waffles.

 ...and for dinner I made my mother Audrey's Homemade Sweet and Sour Meatballs over rice. They were seriously so easy and so good.

Ha ha Kyle looks like he just wanted to dish up and eat his food while I insisted on taking a picture:)

1 1/2 lbs ground beef

1/3 of an onion, chopped

2/3 cup crushed crackers

1/4 cup milk

few dashes of salt and pepper

(I threw in a few shakes of Monterey Garlic and Herb to spice it up)

*Mix together and form into balls. Place in a 9x13 pan and cook on 350' for 30 min or until cooked through (mine took about 40 min)

Sauce:

1 cup ketchup

1 t mustard

2/3 bbq sauce

1 cup brown sugar

1/4 -1/2 cup water until saucey

(Kyle threw in some maple syrup and teryaki sauce just for fun.. ha ha it also calls for worcestershire sauce but we didn't have any.. just play around with flavors)

*Heat mixture until boiling, add meatballs and simmer for 20 min. Top on rice.

(That sauce makes a ton so we halfed it and there was still PLENTY of sauce. Because it was only us two, we actually only ate half the meatballs and saved the other half in the fridge for over spaghetti for another meal:)

Newlywed Life in Logan, Utah

We officially settled down in Logan, UT while Kyle began school again at Utah State. While unfortunately I am still in the process of finding a job, I have managed to spice things up a bit with decorating in the process.. I only have a few pictures because our house was a little messy at the time, so I will be adding more pictures soon!

Our living room

Little picture wall

Our cutest kitchen

I'm hoping one day we can add some paint to these walls? Ha we'll see..

Our cutest bedroom!

Mesa, Arizona Wedding Reception

I cannot thank the Jacobson family enough for their willingness to host our Arizona reception in their gorgeous home. It was another perfect night because of theirs, our parents, and all the friends who generously helped us make our wedding days perfect. The food was amazing tooo!

And yes.. they had edible glitter on them..

We decided to make our Arizona reception a little different from our reception in Utah so that it would still be unique. With that said, we still had our fake wedding cake displayed, but we decided to serve cupcakes and cakepops to our guests. Simply amazing. 

Check her out at designercakesbyapril.com - guaranteed she better then Cakeboss or Ace of Cakes if you watch either of those shows. 

Food Table

Gorgeous flower wreath made by our Arizona florist that now hangs in our home:)

Aww..

Amazing candy table that Wendy Jacobson put together

All our food was "Finger Food", meaning instead of plates we served everything in cups or with toothpicks that people could walk around in hold. Very cute:) Thank you mom for the wonderful idea.

A very special THANK YOU to my sister Ansley for being such an amazing photographer at this reception.