Mom Visits!

Talk about an amazing weekend. Man I love my mom! She was able to come visit over her Birthday, October 29 to November 1. It wasn't quite long enough for me...I loved having her here. I wish we could spend weekends together like that all the time. I can't wait for a couple of years from now when I can see her whenever I want to!

The first night that she came we headed to CRAVE...Cody and I's new favorite restaurant. We had some amazing food and even more amazing chats! Then we went to Red Mango...aka heaven on earth. We are 100% addicted to this place...if you ever have a chance to eat there, do it!

Saturday morning we went to a Diner, Drive-in, and Dive...Dixie Quicks. O MY YUM! It was sooo good, I pretty much had dessert for breakfast, obviously! It was french toast with banana, chocolate, and maple syrup. MMMM! Mom and Cody both got yummy meals too...I can't wait to go there again. Then we went and looked for lights for my parents house, and then to Whole Foods. This store is only the most amazing grocery store ever invented! My mom loved every single moment in this store. The picture at the top is us in front of the self-serve flax...hahahahahha. Love you mom.

Then it was off to the Pedestrian Bridge, lunch at Panara, yummy treats at Delice bakery (bought in advance for mom's birthday on Sunday), dinner at Chipotle (Sorry for the rub-it-in-your-face butt dial Dad), then we strolled around Target. Cody and I have to get our weekly Target visit in...we love that place...and it loves us! Then we went home and watched How to Train a Dragon...soooo cute!

Sunday was my mom's Birthday! I love spoiling her...she has spent almost 25 years spoiling me so it was fun to pay her back, if only for a day. I got up and made her a super delicious fritatta for breakfast, then we went to church. After we came home and went to the Gardens. Mom was in heaven! I loved walking around with her and listening to all of her knowledge about all the different trees and flowers. She knows so much! We made an O-so-Yummy dinner and just relaxed! She opened her and my dad's birthday present, and if I can say so myself, it rocked! (Dad got to open it again when she took it home!) It was a ton of work but it definitely paid off...

I deco-podged each member of our family's pictures on a block, and different scrapbook papers on each side of the blocks. Then sanded the edges and stained them, and this is the finished product!
My cute mom left on Monday morning and it was so sad! I wish she could have stayed for another week. I can hardly wait 5 more weeks until I get to see her, my dad, and my brother!

Our Cruise

Where to begin? We had an amazing 7-day cruise to the Eastern Caribbean. It was great to leave the world behind and spend 7 straight days just with my hubbs! Getting on the ship was quite the ordeal. It seriously took 1.5 hours just to get us from checking in to getting us to our rooms. Then, from there it still took 5 hours to get out bags! So, a quick note to myself: pack all essentials in a carry-on. Essentials being, A SWIMSUIT! The first day was so nice and I would have loved to lounge by the pool, but our suits were in our luggage which wasn't delivered to our room till late. O well. Instead we just explored the ship...and boy O boy there is a TON to explore! The first place we went, of course, was to our room. I was so excited to see our 200-sq. foot room with no window! However, my sneaky, sneaky hubby had changed our reservation without me knowing! He upgraded us to a balcony, and seriously, it was SOOOO worth it! We spent HOURS every day on our balcony just reading and relaxing. I can't imagine being in a box for a week! It was so fun to be able to go stare at the ocean on a chair on our own private balcony. Thank you, thank you, thank you Cody, for knowing me so well!

The boat fit 4500 passengers and 1800 staff, it is one of the largest cruise ships on the ocean right now. I could not believe everything that was on the ship! Theaters, clubs, swimming pools, tons of bars with stages for shows, restaurant after restaurant, the spa, bigger-than-life televisions, pretty much Las Vegas on water. It was amazing!

We spent Saturday, Sunday, and Monday on the ship. I thought we would be bored, but there was definitely no room to be bored! We played Bingo, ate our hearts out, (mainly on desserts...we are major, MAJOR food snobs, so the food didn't quite impress us as much as we hoped) layed on our balcony, (attempted to lay on the pool deck, but there were literally 1000's of people just swarming the pools, not quite our style.) hung out at the spa in the awesome steam rooms, saunas, and massage pools, ate some more, went to the comedy club, and way more!

Tuesday was spent at St. Martin, U.S. Virgin Islands. Talk about beautiful! I could barely get Cody to leave the water...he sure loves the ocean. We body surfed on the waves and just relaxed! Then we headed to town to go shopping.

Cody found a Belgian Chocoate shop, and O MY GOSH! It was seriously so amazing, the best chocolate ever invented! We spent, well, way too much on chocolate. We brought some home so I can't wait to make some KILLER chocolate chip cookies!

We had to eat some food from the island-ers, so we ended up eating conch fritters, jerk wings, (Cody had to eat these, my lips were on FIRE after one nibble!) and coconut shrimp that was to DIE for. We even had to opt for a second order of those:)

Next, we were ready to head back to the ship and saw a yummmmmmy ice cream shop. We were so full from our meal but decided we would give it a shot. Best strawberry cone I have ever had! Ever! I am so glad that we chose to stuff ourselves even further! Ha.

St. Thomas was beautiful as well. Both St. Martin and St. Thomas were pretty ghetto, I was shocked! There were amazing beaches with views like I have never seen, but how the people lived was so, so sad. It really makes you grateful for everything that you are blessed with, that is for sure. We were able to go a calm beach for a few hours, and once more, Cody didn't leave the water! The ocean was so clear here, it was crazy. I could be in water up to my chin and still see my toes!

After swimming we went shopping and I got to barter for an adorable purse and wallet. It was great!

Every night on the ship we went to a different show. Cirque Dreams and Dinner was probably my favorite. There was 10 or so different acts with acrobats, etc. It was seriously amazing what those people could do! We also went to dueling pianos a couple of times. O Man I wish I had my video camera. These guys were out of control good at the piano. You could give them a request for ANY song you could think of and they could play AND sing all the words. They even played the best Lady GaGa rendition we have ever heard. AhH! I wish I could go see them again tonight! There was a improv comedy act that was pretty entertaining, as well as Bingo nights as I mentioned before. One of the really cool shows was Legends in Concert. They had impersonators of Britney Spears, (seriuosly? Is she really considered a legend?) Rod Stewart, and Michael Jackson. Michael was outstanding. Seriously, he looked the part, sang the part, and holy cow could he dance!!! There were seriously people in the theater that I swear thought it was actually him! (He is dead....just in case you are one of those people reading this that thinks we actually saw HIM.) They were screaming and had their hands out to touch him...it was pretty comical!
I am pretty sure that Cody's favorite show was this:

Blue Man Group! They rocked. Period. We loved every second of their show...especially when Cody got called up on stage! It was so fun to see him up there with the blue men! They rubbed blue paint on his face,  put him in a jumpsuit, and took him backstage. Then a backstage camera came on and showed us what they were doing to him...hanging him upside down and throwing blue and pink paint ALL over him! Shooting water balloons filled with paint right at him, and then they left him there, hanging upside down, all alone! I was dying! (Half laughing, half kind of worried...) A few minutes later the stage crew rolled out a big black box with a huge jello mold on top of it. The Blue Men ripped the jello apart, and who's head was in it?!?! CODY'S! He went through quite a lot...from my point of view anyway...
It turns out that they faked us out that it was him backstage getting painted on and hung upside down, but he really did put his head in JELLO! It was a blast. We even went back another time to enjoy it again.

The last day of our cruise we went to Nassau, Bahamas. It was pretty crazy to see the two different parts of the island. One is Nassau, where all of the islanders live. It was COVERED in flea markets, taxi drivers, and pretty shabby homes. There were a few areas that had some nice shopping, but they were still randomly placed in the middle of ghetto areas. Then there was Paradise Island. This is where the Atlantis resort is. (We went and saw it, it was pretty neat but I wouldn't ever want to actually vacation there. There were tons of tourists, like us, just swarming the place. If I paid the big bucks to stay there I would want it a little more private). Paradise Island also had some GINORMOUS homes. People like Oprah Winfrey, Tiger Woods and Ted Turner have homes on the coast and they were pretty stinking amazing.
We had the opportunity to go Scuba diving in the Bahamas. It was insane. It was awesome! We were trained for, O, about 20 minutes, then shoved underwater and told to breathe! (We had to pass a few tests, but it was pretty simple). It was so neat to be able to breathe underwater! We really enjoyed it and are thinking about getting certified.

Wow, if you made it through that post, you get a gold star. If not, no worries, this is really for us to remember all the fun details! Overall it rocked. I am so glad that my hubby has the insight to know that I really needed this break. I loved just chilling with my best friend for a whole week. It relaxes me just thinking about it!

We're Back

A report of our awesome 7-day cruise will soon be posted! I have to develop our waterproof camera first...hopefully it doesn't take too long. Be excited to hear about all the fun that we had!

Bye, Bye!

Yep, Cody and I are leaving in 2 days to hit up the Bahamas on THIS CRUISE SHIP. I can't even believe that it is finally here! Our ship is awesome...two of the shows on our ship are Blue Man Group and Cirque de Sole. It is a brand new ship and I can't wait to explore it! I had to add a couple pictures to jazz up my farewell post...so you get cute Teddy, Ali, and of course, JANE! I am going to miss these 3 girls so much...I literally see them every single day, talk to the on the phone every day, and text them every day! (I know, all three seems like a bit much...!) I don't think Teddy or Ali will grow much while I am gone, but Jane will probably look a whole lot different. I will sure miss them.
On the other hand, 12 days, TWELVE days after I get back, my MOM is coming to visit. O my gosh. Honestly, I can't wait. CAN'T WAIT. I will have her all to myself, and maybe share with Cody a little.
Bye, bye! See you in the Bahamas....or you will see pictures of US in the Bahamas anyway!

10 Days Until Bahamas

Yep. This is a countdown. In our shower. (With washable crayons...cute, HUH!?) We only have 10 days left until our 7 day cruise to the Bahamas. 7 amazing days with my out-of-this world hubby, who surprised me with this present 4 1/2 months ago. How did he know that I would need it SOOO bad right now? He is one rocking dude. Can't wait to be with him and only him for an ENTIRE WEEK. O, and for the beach, the shows, and reading to my hearts content. (And...he made dinner for me tonight. AND cleaned up. Enough said.)

Hot Dog Party!

Yep, you read it right...we had a hot dog party! The day before the fall semester started our Cody and I organized a Hot Dog Party for our neighborhood, and it was a hit! We had at least 10 different types of toppings for hot dogs...I know, it sounds so gross. But really, they are all so different and so delish! Some of the toppings made the hot dogs not even taste like a hot dog! It was quite the event, we have decided that it will now be a tradition. Some of the flavors are below for you to check out! Cody did the BBQ dogs, pictured above, ALL BY HIMSELF! He homemade the BBQ sauce, yes, slaved for seriously 3-4 hours on it! He also made the slaw, he was like superman in the kitchen that day. I made the bruschetta dogs, and they were my fave. I LOVE fresh basil and tomato, and these even had balsamic vinegar...YUM!

Kansas City and Prairie Club

Alright...we have done quite a few fun things as of late, I have just been a totally LAME blogger. Seriously, I have TONS of recipes to blog about on mmmcafe, and haven't posted one in over a month! I guess you could say that life is a little crazy. I have been SUPER busy with hair, and I have even done a few PHOTOSHOOTS in the past few weeks. I really do love taking pictures, I should try to promote myself more because I enjoy it sooo much. Make sure you hop over to my photography blog to check them out!

Now for a re-cap of the past month of our lives...

We went to Kansas City with the youth a few weekends ago. I was so scared that it was going to be a nightmare, but the kids were really good and we actually had a blast. Teddy was supposed to come and her Dr. told her that she couldn't at the very last minute, I was majorly bummed...like brought to tears bummed. It would have been quite a bit more enjoyable with her there, but we survived! Scott was a trooper and hung with Cody and I and a few other leaders all weekend. We were able to go to some church sites, and I learned so much! We visited Adam-ondi-Ahman first:

then Far West:

Then Independence which included the Mormon Visitors Center, the Community of Christ Temple (crazy experience), and Liberty Jail:

We were especially excited that we were able to go to Scott's favorite BBQ joint, Oklahoma Joes. It really was amazing, some of the best ribs I have ever had! Good find Scott!

Whew...lots of pictures!

Next is the big Golf-Trip-Of-The-Year with Scott and Cody. They woke up at 4 am and drove 5 hours accross Nebraska just for a golf course! The Prairie Club Golf Course is outside of Valentine, NE. They played 36 holes the first day and 36 holes the second day...talk about some golf! They had a wonderful time, (and Teddy and I had a wonderful time, too! We spent an entire day working on cute Jane's bedroom, it was seriously soooo much fun. Then we headed out to dinner and to YUMMY red Mango. We had a blast and a half together!) Here are some pictures to commemorate the boys' 2 crazy days:

Holy cow...I hope you kept up with all of that craziness! We have been having a great time while Cody was off for a few weeks, and now back to the grind! He is back to studying like a mad man and I am working away. Until our next adventure....!!!

Family Pictures

I have finally posted our family pictures! I am so sorry that I kept you all waiting, but finally they are here. We are so happy with the memories that we will have of Warner Nathan. He made such an impact on our lives, we are so thankful for eternal families and the blessing that we will get to see him again after this life.

CLICK HERE to see our favorites.

Love these girls

I just had to share a super fun evening I had last week. It was Ali's birthday, and Teddy and I surprised her with a girls night out! It was so extremely fun. Pete (Al's hubb) blindfolded her, walked her around the neighborhood (aka the parking lot with 1 screaming Anders and 1 happy Owen) until he sat her in my car and off we went!

We went out to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and shared pizza, lettuce wraps, and a to die for Greek Salad. Then off to the mall for a shopping spree! Pete supplied the funds for her shopping and we went crazy buying her stuff left and right. Then we went to Whole Foods for some amazing homemade gelato and a really gross white chocolate coconut cookie thing. At least the gelato was worth going there for! It was so fun, I wish we could repeat it every weekend. These two girls make each and every day so much better for me...I already dread two years from now when they leave Omaha...tear...let's not talk about it!

Are you ready?!

Seriously, are you ready for a MAJOR LONG post?! I have so much to update on...where to begin?

Well, the last week in May Cody and I took a little vacation to Rhodes, IA to play a course in the top 100 golf courses in the country. It was so beautiful. It was only 3 hours away so that was great! We spent the night at a perfect little hotel with a balcony looking over hole #2-so pretty.

We made a pit stop in Des Moines, Iowa on the way to the course. They have a super big, nice mall and...well...that's about it. I did get some new mineral makeup at the mall(thanks for the recommendation Wendy) and so far I really like it. It is a little time consuming but my face does feel cleaner and clearer!

Next...sushi night! We had our best friends over, Scott and Teddy, and we had a sushi night! We had so much fun, all of us were making it together.

We even decided to FRY entire sushi rolls...O my gosh! They were out of this world. Not to mention SOO healthy...ha. We also made sticky rice with mango coconut sauce. TO DIE FOR. That recipe will be on my food blog soon!

Okay...I can't even believe this one...3 year anniversary! June 23, 2007 we were married and it has been 3 years. It seems so short and so long. I feel like we have been married forever. We went golfing and out to P.F. Chang's. It was a great day, and I love, love, love the man I am married to. I can't say that enough. We are perfect for eachother!

We headed out Golfing to Iron Horse, a course just outside of Omaha. It is super nice, and it was so super fun. We went with Scott and Teddy and it was so fun to have Teddy for company out there on the course. We have such a blast together, and so do the boys so it is great. They golfed in a tourney at the same course a week after and WON! They are so awesome, and winning always makes it better.

Alright, last but not least. We headed to Minneapolis, Minnesota this past weekend for a getaway. It was so much fun...We couldn't believe how CLEAN this city was! Really, there was not trash anywhere! When we pulled into downtown Cody said, "Whoa, it's like we are on another planet!" The buildings were super future-istic...it was unreal.

Our hotel was so neat...it was downtown in the middle of all the hustle and bussle.(sp?!?!) We spent an entire day at the Mall of America! It was so much fun...we shopped our hearts out. There was a Nordstrom. Need I say more? Seriously made us so happy! We used to go to Nords every week when we lived in Provo, just to go, not to buy anything! We were in La-la land, it was great. We also loved the Puma store, Nike store, and Nordstrom Rack. The mall was SO huge, there were 520 stores and 26 rides in the middle of the mall. There was a huge movie theater and a mini putt course. We went to the movie Eclipse and both loved it! What is not to love?! Vampires, Werewolves, yeah! (heheh mom?!)

We ate at a totally awesome restaurant called Crave. We had a sushi roll, calamari from heaven, and GRILLED caesar salad. After we left we found out that they are in the process of building the same restaurant in Omaha! O my gosh we were so excited. It should open in the fall and we can't wait to eat there.

We also ate a JUICY LUCY. A super juicy burger STUFFED with cheese. Cody found this hometown favorite on Food Wars on Food Network. I am so glad, WE are so glad, that we went. This burger was awesome! We are already trying to figure out how to make our own perfect Juicy Lucy...I am sure that you will hear about it when we make them!

And...what is a vacation without some golf?! We hit up a course just outside of Minneapolis, and it was really neat. They all are! We had a great time, except for the first 5 holes...rain, rain, o yeah, some more rain! It was absolutely pouring.

O the horizon...pictures of Warner! I spoke with the photographer from Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep a few days ago, she said in the next week we should have our pictures. O my heavens I can't wait to see them.

We are also heading back to Billings for a weekend! We are elated. Cody is going to play in the yearly golf tourney, the Tangle, at Briarwood with my pops, and I am going to enjoy our families, especially my 2 nephews and niece! I can't even talk about it I just get so anxious!