The Game

We watched the BYU vs UTAH game on Saturday and I made some treats to snack on. I've never made orange rolls before and decided to attempt them. I found the recipe on My Kitchen Cafe and they turned out delicious. So we took the orange rolls with us and headed down to Lehi to watch the game over at Mat's cousins home. Mats brother Josh and wife Melissa came as well. We had a good time. Too bad BYU won, but it was a good game to watch because it was down to the wire on who was going to win. Dan (Mat's cousin) was really happy they won cause he is a huge BYU fan. Until next year.

Thanksgiving such a wonderful time of the year.

So Mat and I had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year. We both have so much to be grateful for. We are truly blessed. We are so grateful this year for a new home, great support from family and friends, and that Mat was able to find new job so quickly. So the day started off my going to my mom's to eat. There were lots of people and lots of good food. I made some homemade crescents from scratch. They were really yummy.

I also made some yams. They were pretty tasty.

Mat and Me.

Some of the gang.

More of the gang.

Cute Payton who still absolutely loves Mat and doesn't want anything to do with me.

After eating some of us played a little bingo (for prizes) to help us burn off some calories. It was fun even though I didn't win.

After that we went to Mat's mom's and had another meal. It was good. I ate way to much food. I also made some yams to take there. Mat really enjoyed them. He loves yams. We had a nice time. We played some Yahtzee after we ate. It was fun.
Here is Mat with his mom.

Here is a cute picture of one of our step-nieces (I think that's what she would be to us). She is cute and sure likes her olives.

Thanksgiving was great. It is so nice to spend time with family and to have a couple days off of work. On Friday we went and saw New Moon. We had a great couple of days off, but it always goes by way to fast.

Cafe Rio Style

So the other weekend we had some friends over for dinner and I made some homemade Cafe Rio and it was delicious. Here is the recipe:

Pork (I used chicken, but pork is delicious too)

3 to 4 lbs. Pork loin (I used about 4 to5 chicken breast)

1 cup brown sugar

1 bottle red taco sauce

1 Tbls cumin

1 can coke (12 ounces)

Cook pork/or chicken on low in crock pot with water covering ½ pork for 6 hours or until able to shred. Three hours before serving, drain liquid off pork, and add coke, taco sauce, brown sugar, and cumin. Continue to cook for approximately 3 more hours.

Tomatillo Dressing

1 pkg Dry Buttermilk Dressing (ranch)

3 Tomatillos

1 cup Mayo

1 cup Buttermilk

1 cup Cilantro (chopped)

1 Garlic glove

¼ to ½ tsp Cayenne Pepper

Rice (This is a rice recipe that I have done before, but I did not do this time)

White rice

Chicken Broth

Chopped Cilantro

Chopped White Onions

Lime Juice

You get to experiment on the portion sizes. Cook the rice in chicken broth instead of water with cilantro, onions, and lime juice

Rice (This is what I did this time)

2 cups white rice

2 cups chicken broth

2 cups water

1 garlic clove

A Little olive oil

Chopped up garlic glove, put a little oil olive in pot, add garlic to pot. Stir constantly for a couple of minutes until garlic is golden. Add chicken broth, water, and rice. Bring to boil, reduce heat to low and cook for about 15 to 20 minutes or until rice is tender.

Then I get a tortilla and load it up with lettuce, rice, beans, meat, tomatoes, cheese, and then top it with the tomatillo dressing. It is really tasty.

Finally some pictures of our Home with our Furniture

Here is our cute little home that we love.

Here is our backyard with our nice deck that Mat helped build.

Front entry-way, that still needs more decorating.

Our living room with our new couches (at least they seem new cause we bought them in January and have never used them until now).

Dining room.

Kitchen

In our bedroom, the entry-way to the bathroom.

Master bathroom.

The study

Extra bedroom which will be a baby's room someday.

Spare bathroom.

We really love our new house. It is so nice, clean, and perfect for us. We are so glad we decided to build it. We love the area and our neighborhood. We are so lucky and blessed.

Kids are smarter these days...

A couple of weeks ago I babysat my niece and nephew. They are so stinkin' cute even if my 5 year old niece can beat me at pool on the Wii. I was terrible at pool and my niece was getting impatient with my lack of Wii skills, but to my defense I did beat her in ping pong, but only by 2. So, I'll keep my day job. Here is a cute picture of us. I was trying to hold the camera in front us while trying to take a picture. After each picture I took my niece wanted to see the results. I usually cut off part of us and she just laughed and laughed and thought it was so funny.

Here is me trying to take a picture of the three of us.

They are getting so big. I wish I could just make time stop so they don't get any bigger. I had a nice evening babysitting them. We played the Wii and then Uno and yes I lost to my 5 year old niece in the first game and lost to my 4 year old nephew in the second game. I was not letting them win either. I guess I need some practice on the Wii and in playing Uno.

Job Offer...

We are so very excited. Mat got a job offer today- yeah!!! He was unemployed for exactly 4 weeks and finally got a job offer. He had several interviews this week and one that worked out really well. He will be a client accountant and will be working downtown. He starts next Thursday. We are so grateful for how blessed we are.

Halloween Festivities of Fun

On Friday night we were babysitting and we took some of our nieces and nephews to a trunk-or-treat. Sydney was a cute little witch, Will was a skeleton, and Drew (not pictured) had a little ghost bib.

My brother and his wife came to the trunk-or-treat as well. They wanted to take Payton our niece. She was a little fairy. She is getting so big.

Here are the kids in the trunk before it started. They are sure adorable.

Trying to stay warm in the back of the car with Drew, Syd, and Will while Mat was still passing out candy to other kids at the trunk-or-treat.

Last Monday night at Family Night we carved pumpkins. Mat and I look pretty intense and serious about carving our pumpkins.

Here's some of the fam carving away.

Cute baby Drew sleeping through most of the pumpkin carving.

Will was having a good old time dancing around while I was taking pictures of him. After each picture I took he had to come and see it. It was really cute.

The kids jumping in a big pile of leaves.

Aidan and his pumpkin.

The kids pumpkins. I think this is a great idea because it is less messy and easier for kids because they don't have to carve anything.

Here are just some of the pumpkins that the family carved that night.
Cinderella (I think)

Captain Jack Sparrow

Yoda

Cat

This is my pumpkin. I always do very simple because I don't like to spend forever carving pumpkins. I just stuck with the traditional jack-o-lantern look. It works for me.

Mat spent a lot longer on his pumpkin and he did a little gremlin. He did a great job.

Next Halloween activity we did a couple Saturday's ago was the Fun Fall Family Festival which this year got changed to the Freaky Family Fun Fall Festival. It has too many f's if you ask me, but we had a nice time. We started out with pumpkin carving. Mat and I passed, but it was fun to watch the others carve their pumpkins.

Me just chillin' and snackin' on some yummy food.

Very cute picture of my cousin Mindy and her niece Lilly.

This was an attempt of mine to take pictures of the pumpkins in the dark. The picture kind of turned out cool looking.

Here is another attempt at taking pictures of the beautiful carved pumpkins.

We had a nice time and had lots of good food to eat afterwords. We had fun with all of our Halloween festivities this year.