Thanksgiving

Ah, Thanksgiving. What a great holiday! You get to eat ridiculous amounts of food, have fun with family and it rings in the rest of the holiday season. Bryan and I spent our second Thanksgiving together at his mom's house in Morgan. Of course, it was our first as a married couple. We went up with David on Wednesday night and spent all of Thanksgiving Day there.

Here is some of our spread (I think some of it was on the counter). Who knows how we fit it all? I made those sweet potatoes on the corner. They are my mom's recipe and they are one of my favorite things she makes for holidays.

How good does this look? This is my plate of turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing and "pink stuff" (as they call the jello salad in Bryan's family).

Bryan wanted me to take a picture of his plate as well. Oh. Bryan made deliciously moist rolls, pictured here.

I also made two pumpkin pies (the pie tins were small so the filling made for two). It was my first time! Pumpkin pie is so easy to make-- I never knew! Getting the crust right is the hardest part if you're doing it from scratch... especially when you have to go to four different stores to find a pastry cutter. Our friend Weston is over right now and we are all actually enjoying some leftover pumpkin pie/

I also made an apple pie! Both pies turned out well-- I probably liked the apple best. Thank you Our Best Bites!

Here we are sporting our fall colors. I had to specifically ask Bryan to wear this shirt.

Unfortunately, I had to work Friday and Saturday so our holiday got cut a little short. We stayed until about 9:30PM and then headed to the Park City Outlets for a little Black Friday shopping. I've never been one for crowds but this is a little tradition that Bryan and his friends have and it is pretty fun once you get to the actual shopping part.

Bryan's Birthday

Last Friday, the 18th, was Bryan's 25th Birthday! Now we are both a quarter of a century old. I don't have many pictures to share. It seems like when we get together in a group I never remember to take pictures or maybe it just feels unnatural to do so.

Every Friday at work at have an 8AM meeting and then I come home and go back for my shift around 11:45AM. Because I had worked extra time during the course of the week and came in early to help on another day when staff was low, I didn't have to be back until 1:45PM! So, I came home and Bryan opened his presents and I made us BLECs (Bacon, Lettuce, Egg, Cheese) sandwiches on sourdough bread for his birthday breakfast. Then I cleaned and started his birthday cake and, even with all the extra time, I just made it to work after getting things done! Bryan's favorite meal is chicken enchiladas that his mom made for him while he was growing up so I made those and we threw a bit of a dinner party with our friends. Here is the 3 layer chocolate cake with cream cheese frosting and chocolate ganache that I made for his birthday:

Here we are singing to Bryan just before he blows out his candles. Look at that fire hazard!

On Saturday we drove up to his mom's house to spend the weekend there. We visited his grandma for her birthday later in the month and then came home to eat delicious Tortilla Soup and Texas "Sheep" Cake for dessert! We spent the rest of the weekend playing games and having fun together. We'll head up there again for Thanksgiving later this week!

For his birthday, Bryan got a book called "The Backyard Blacksmith" from me (blacksmithing is a hobby he'd like to pursue someday). He also got Pandemic (a board game that he loves), Tron on 3D blu-ray and DVD, an awesome larger fish tank for Gordon that has a filter, a hair clipper set and Zelda: Skyward Sword.

I am grateful to have Bryan in my life. Every day I realize more and more how well suited we are to each other. He is someone I can be entirely myself with and who I feel safe with. I'm so glad I get to be married to this great guy!

Happy Halloween!

 Here are our simple decorations. For FHE on the first Monday of October we cut out bats and decorated the apartment. Bryan cut out so many bats he decided to turn on Wipeout. 

 On the Monday before Halloween we carved pumpkins (we didn't want to do them too early, else they would rot before the holiday!).

 (This was also my first day actually at work tellering for America First. See the little compass pin?)

 Like last year, I made a cat. It was just too classic to only do once! 

 Bryan's first top was too small... his next too big. I think it looks pretty cool, though. Like a puzzle! Speaking of puzzles...

Here is a puzzle we've been working on! It is a LOST Mystery Puzzle. We don't even know what it is supposed to look like but we've been having fun slowly putting it together. Back to pumpkins...

 Bryan made the Zelda Tri-Force.

 As mentioned, I made a cat.

 

Over the weekend we went to a couple parties with our friends. We dressed up as Napoleon Dynamite and Deb! All our clothes (my pants, shirt, fanny pack and his shirt) were a whopping $10 at DI! The wig was a little more... and it was weirdly shaped, too! I had to give his wig a bit of a hair cut to make it look right but it worked out in the end. Anyway, on Saturday we had Alicia come over and we watched the old (1959) House on Haunted Hill. It was a Rifftrax version so people were adding goofy commentary the whole way through. In the end I still didn't know if the house was actually haunted or if it was all human created. It had a lot of unresolved plot lines. I was baffled when the credits suddenly began to roll. Oh, well!

 

 We didn't do much for the actual holiday but I made stuffed peppers and carved little jack-o-lanterns out of them. I also tried to make mashed potato ghosts. The shaping didn't come out quite right (thanks for all the direction, Martha Stewart) but they sure did taste good! After that we went and saw Cowboys & Aliens with David, Weston and friend. I probably wouldn't buy the movie but I did enjoy it for a dollar.

We definitely enjoyed our low-key first Halloween together.