Halloween

This Halloween season was a pretty good one. I love halloween and FALL, and always feel like it goes by way to fast... such was the case this year but I feel like I did alot of stuff to help me enjoy the fall.

I made these paper lantern pumpkins- I saw them in Martha S. a few years ago but never had a house to hang them on. Now we have a cute porch with perfect places to hang them!

I won't lie, I was too cheap to buy a halloween wreath- so I bought a $2 grapevine wreath and glued this black feather boa to it, It looked kinda cool because below it we had a bale of hay with crows on it and a witches broom.

We had tonz of little gourd and pumpkins on our front porch and Millie would play with them 2-3 times a day for 15-20 min each time. She'd sort them, carry them around and move them. It was the best activity for her!

We went trick or treating to about 4 houses. (we just wanted to get Millie dressed up and we also wanted an excuse to meet some more neighbors) She was a little german girl- with a costume josh got in Bavaria. (don't ask what I'm doing or wearing) We went to the ward trunk or treat on wed. as the biggest loser crew. Josh was bob, I was Jillian, Millie and brett were contestants. Brett wore an official biggest looser T-shirt and stuffed himself with pillows and Millie wore an oversized "rice crispy treats" T-shirt and we stuffed her belly with a blanket. She loved it, surprisingly. Of course we forgot to bring our camera.

Millie's fav. part was playing in the candy bowl and passing out treats to the few trick-or-treaters that we had

Hope you had a happy halloween!

Halloween meal

Every year I make a special Halloween meal. I thought I'd share it with you in case you wanted to make it too. Here's what's on the menu this year:

Appetizers:

candy corn crackers

Devilish eggs

Main dish:

• spaghetti with Meat ball eye balls (spread sour cream over top of meat ball and top with slice of green olive)
  

Side dish(s)

• Garlic toast in the shape of pumpkins (use a cookie cutter)
• Rest in Peas ( below )

Dessert

Caldron ice cream

(dip a balloon in melted chocolate and then freeze it, pop baloon and serve mint chocolate chip ice cream inside)

Happy cooking

Millie update

This post is for family out in utah who got used to seeing Millie all the time and now haven't seen her for a month... She turned 11 months this week. She's a pro walker now (she's been walking for a month and a half) and is of course into everything. Here's a little bit more about what she's been up to...

She loves swimming (and having baths) This is her cool new pool.

She has 4 teeth now- got her top 2 a couple weeks ago (sorry, this is the only photo we have with the top teeth showing)

Josh got this little German outfit in Germany this summer.

She knows how to go up AND down the stairs but that wasn't enough from her... she discovered how to climb up the back side of the stairs (actually I think she picked it up off her little 2 year old friend.)

She likes practicing how to use her spoon, needless to say, she hasn't mastered it yet.

Her favorite thing is to grab a piece of fruit from the fruit basket and chomp on it- she'll eat a whole nectarine or plum.

She had an eye check up (at Josh's school) She had her eyes dilated so they could check stuff, she wasn't a fan of that, but she enjoied these glasses they gave her.

I found this life jacket at target for $6 (summer clearance) and thought it'd be come in very handy some day- millie HATED it, so naturally Josh got a kick out of it. Meanie.

oh, and her "words"

-ma ma & da da

- dog

-jesus

-banana

And the best, if you ask her what an owl says she'll say "Whoo"

electronically challenged continued...

things that broke today...

we replaced my car battery yesterday. I drove my car and it ran great and had so much power then today my car wouldn't start. (apparently a piece to the battery cable has fallen of.) after I discovered we were stranded we went inside and turned on Baby einstein- T.V. blacked out after 10 min. and will not turn back on (this is our second t.v. since coming home. We got it used from a friend) I'm so sad!!!

electronically challenged

We had been feeling bad for our friends because they had been "Automotivly challenged"- they kept having random expensive car troubles. Then we starting having all sorts of things break and decided we were electronically challenged. In the past 2 weeks-
Sep 3- arrived home to a broken DVD player
Sep 4- found our travel DVD player to be broken (just used it the day prior)
Sep 6- my phone broke, I could text and someone could call me and hear what I was saying but I couldn't hear them
Sep 7- Josh's phone broke- just completely froze
Sep 9- got new phones
Sep 10- Josh is driving home from school and his "manifold" to his muffler started falling off and was dragging under his car the whole 15 miles... now we start to become not only electronically challenged but automotively challenged too. NO!
Sep 10- my new phone was defective and broke, went back, traded phone
Sep 14- computer just randomly shuts down and will not turn back on
Sep 16- go out to start my car and it won't start- battery's dead. completely (The car people kept telling me it was getting old)

I had some good photos to post, but, until our computer's up and running I'll just have to make boring posts like this. BUT- the good news of my life is that today the Pest control people are coming. AMEN! get those cockroaches and spiders outa my life!!!

just me tonight

I do not being home alone, certanily not! (because I just get so darn scared!- you'd think i'd get over it by now) BUT there is something to be said about a warm quiet night, millie asleep, sitting on my bed of a nice CLEAN room, wearing my favorite sweats, checking out your great blogs, eating a nice big bowl of Ice cream (ok, my 2nd nice big bowl) while a loaf of bread bakes in the oven... so peacefull, so relaxing! So though I love ya Josh, and don't like to be home alone, sometimes it's SO nice just to have some "me time"

land of the delta blues

We've been back in Memphis for 2 weeks now. I was excited to come back, crazy, i know!

here are 14 reasons I'm glad to be back, 1 for each day we've been here

1. Magnolia trees

2. Beautiful sunsets

3. The chance you have of crossing paths with a fox while out running

4. Tall beautiful trees everywhere

5. The "sweet" smell in the air (rachel H., I see what you were talking about now)

6. My ward and friends! such great people

7. BBQ nachos

8. Howards doughnuts

9. Super yard sales

10. Beautiful houses (I love the houses/mansions on Riveredge drive, and the row houses on forest-hill Irene)

11. Janie and Jack in germantown, well, just Germantown in general

12. Collierville arlington road (through the country)

13. SUPER friendly people in the stores - always wanting to talk.

14. collierville town square

Bonus: turtle bayou on the trail by chick-filet

Proud owner of...

I'm the owner of 18 new mosquito bites. Any secret remedies would be appreciated.

Some egg cups for Whit

She loves theses things.

6th Gear, Stairs, and Lederhosen

So what's the best thing since white bread? 6th gear on the Autobahn. I was going like 190km in this Peugot 308 on my way to Munich and Audis and BMW are still flying by me. I'm red lining it and thinking, "How are they going by me so fast?" I stop at one of my sites and when I get back in the car I have to reverse. Well R is up and to the left and you have to pull up a little lever. And that's when I noticed my little friend 6th Gear in the bottom right. Well it was 210km/hour after that...and not in the red zone. Glorious.
I meant to go to the St Lorenz Cathedral in the picture but I ended up at this church first. And after going in the church this little old lady motions me to the back to the tower. We hike up it and she lets me go by her after about 20 stairs. I kept trying to listen to hear for a stroke or a fall from this lady. I was worried about myself too (I'm carrying about 20 extra pounds right now). But I make it to the top and I did notice the sign at the bottom that said 1,50 Euros but surely they would collect it at the bottom before you hiked up like 3,000 stairs. Nope! This lady at the top only speaking German was asking for the money. I said, "Mein Geld ist in mein Auto. Ich will gehen und geben das Geld." She said not to worry about it, but I felt like I should. The church and the tower were awesome and I felt like a building of God deserved it. So after I took this picture and realized I wasn't even in the Cathedral, I ran down to my car and back up the 3,000 stairs (not really) and gave her 2,00 Euros and told her to keep the change. She gave me a postcrad. Needless to say I was pitting big time.
Finally I made it to Munich and I went to eat some Bavarian food. To my glee, there was a horde of dudes dresses in Lederehosen. Apparently, this small village has a tradition once a year where they sit around to protect the trees from getting cut down. If not many trees are cut down, it's a success. Well obviously there isn't much to do but drink. So they drink and wait, drink and wait. And then drink to celebrate a successful year for the tress. One guy said it's just another reason to drink. They offered to buy me a drink but I told them I was Mormon, and it probably wouldn't help my driving on the Autobahn. They liked that one.

Provo Half Marathon

A week ago I begrudgingly ran the provo river half marathon. I had wanted to do it, but then as it got closer I almost didn't sign up because I felt like I'd be dissapointed because I wasn't in as good of shape after Millie... but my friend Maren and sister Tracy were going to do it so I decited it'd do it anyways. I'm glad i did because I ended up feeling SOOO great and getting a PR by 2 min! I ran a 1:28! The course is so pretty and mostly down hill- (so if any of you are looking for a half marathon to do sign up for this one! it's getting really popular with 3,500 runners this year)

It's races like this that keep me motivated to run... you feel good, in controll, but you know that you are really pushing yourself. When you're finished you're just so proud of yourself for going through that much pain and not giving up!




The race finished at riverwoods where they had fruit, pancakes, and a live band! not to mention an ice cold provo river to ice your achy legs in.



Tracy, Maren (my old roomie from BYU) and me. We were all so happy because we all did better than we'd expected :)

The Autobahn to Prague

Czechs have such a great sense of humor! I rented a car at 6am. Picked up Coach and then we FLEW down the Autobahn at 110mph in the slow lane to Prague.
Prague is incredible. This is The St. Vitus' Cathedral. St. Vitus wouldn't tell the King who the queen was sleeping around with after her confesssion so the King had him killed and thrown in the river. Coach and I huffed it on it foot right after our tour ended to try and get to it before it closed. Got there at 5:42pm. The cathedral doors closed at 5:40pm. So even though we didn't get to see the inside, it was still worth the run. I've decided I love Gothic architecture. This clock is the Old Town Horologe. Some Czech guy built it in 1410 and it was cutting edge technology. It was so incredible that he was thanked by having his eyes gauged out so that he couldn't creat another one like it. He cursed it and it didn't work for nearly 100 years until someone was able to fix it.

Sachenhausen Concentration Camp

Obviously you have heard about the horrors and atrocities of the concentration camps. You can read about this which is mild compared to many of the other things that took place about 40 minutes north of Berlin.
Pictures weren't allowed in certain areas and the most touching thing I saw was this small black shoe with a colorful bouquet of flowers from the top of it. It was only about 3 inches long but very intricate and detailed. But the story is that a 16 year old Russian student saved a portion of his bread at every meal to mold and sculpt this shoe. He eventually gave it to another prisoner, a German liberal professor, just before he died. The professor said, "It was the most beautiful gift anyone has ever given me." It made me wonder if the professor had helped gived morale or encourage this young 16 year through the hard times. I was really touched. Their portions were meager to say the least, and this truly was a sacrifice for this 16 year old.

Germany's Guilt

(Bottom picture) While on the tour of Berlin, our guide talked about Germany's guilt. Instead of trying to sweep their past under the carpet, they have taken responsibility for it. The company that produced the chemicals for the gas chambers is the same company that recently and freely supplied the anti-graffiti finish for the Jewish Memorial stones in the center of Berlin. And there are a lot of stones there. Did you know Hugo Boss did the Nazi uniforms? Neither did I. But our tour of Berlin was splendid. We did a walking tour and learned so much.

(Middle picture) "Where they burn books, they will also in the end burn human beings" - Heine. Here I am lying on a glass covering a room full of empty bookshelves. This memorial stands to remember when the Nazis began burning 25,000 books which didn't fit in with their plans. Symbolically, some of Einsteins work and one of Hitler's favorite authors were among them.

(Top picture) The Berliner Damme. Just a large impressive builiding on the Spree River.

Essen essen essen - Eat eat eat

Now that I am done running for a while, I eat eat eat. Here we are at an authentic German place. I ate a blood sausage, liver suasage, and a liver dumpling with potatoes and some great saurkraut on the side. My comrades got some other great German food. We've had fun. The drink is called Spezi (a mix of Cola and Fanta.) Coach Eyestone and I ate pig knuckle the night before. It was good too. I love Germany. Tomorrow Coach and I are heading to Prague for a day.

Sweden Trip

We got back from Sweden a few days ago and had a GREAT trip. I love visiting other countries and seeing the fashion, FOOD, and life styles. The "feel" of sweden was very nordic. Lots of trolls, gnomes, ships, and striped clothing, vikings, reindeer/moose and lingonberries. The style was very modern and clean (ie ikea). I felt that Sweden was kind of a mix between Germany and France. The woodland and magic of germany mixed with the glamor of france

Josh's race went well, it was an international race with lots of good guys. Going into the race he was ranked 12th out of 16 guys, and he finished 5th!

Here are some of the highlights of our trip...

Gamla Stan: old city. This row of buildings is one of the most photographed areas in the old city. it is in a cute little square with traditional restaurants all around the perimiter. The old city was soo cool because you really felt like you were taking a step back in time, it was a very large area filled with delicious restaraunts, shops, cool buildings, and street preformers.

Stockholm has alot of "inlets" and rivers and lakes. The entrance to the old city was just across this bridge. I like this photo because it shows some of the cool buildings and then this guy on his bike with a basket on it- which seemed to be very standard in Sweden.

While we were in the old city we saw a portion of what we think was the changing of the guard. They played music and wore very nice outfits.

This Troll was just hanging out in Gamla Stan. I love Trolls, Gnomes, Fairies, Elves and (all magical folk) so I had to get my photo with this little guy.

Our hotel was in downtown Stockholm near the old city. This was the view from our room. On sunday morning the bells were ringing and it almost felt magical!

After Josh's race was over we wanted to see more countryside and not just the big tourist city of Stockholm (though stockholm was great.) We rented a car and drove west. We stoped at a few castles and churches. This was one little city that we stopped at. Beautiful! Across the bay was teh castle below.

Another beautiful castle. All the castles we saw were built on bodies of water making them all the more spectacular!

An old church in the country just 30 min. outside of Stockholom.

The Food: They had some delicous ice cream. I got this tripple scoop of Lemon sorbet, raspberry sorbet (with chunks of raspberries) and tripple chocolate. (the raspberry and chocolate were a killer combo)

Lots of delicious breads and pastries

We had a really nice traditional dinner, this is Josh's plate: reindeer with lingonberries, greanbeans, and potatoe cake. I had Elk Meatballs with lingonberry sauce- so good!

This is just a country road. Many of the small country roads were lined with trees, so quaint!

I always get curious about what houses in other countries look like, so here is a Swedish house. Most of them are vertical "wood siding" with these red roofs. also quaint.

This trip may very well have been mine and Josh's last trip (alone) together for a long time. Though I'm so glad to have millie giving up on the great travels has been one of the hard things for me...so world, catch ya later.