Mundane Things

It's been a while since I've graced this blog with my presence. There's just not been much going on. Of course, we've continued our frequent ski trips:

I'm still awesome.

But other than that, we've been pretty boring around here. A few weeks ago, Matt had a couple of business trips to Aspen and St. Paul, MN. I spent my time alone baking, watching Gilmore Girls, and catching up on my Better Homes and Gardens subscription, so that was a productive week. I've been sick a couple times, which meant more Gilmore Girls and magazines. Awesome. And sadly, my Spring Break has come and gone. I got some cleaning done, had a can't-wait-for-summer trip to Oskar Blues, baked some more, and spent a lot of time reading my books. We also bought a chest freezer.


What thrilling lives we lead.

But baking and watching TV and reading is fun. In fact, after spending all of my February free-time practicing for Salem's wedding, I've found myself wanting to bake all the time. Usually with Gilmore Girls on in the background.

Some of my yummy baking. Raspberry-filled shortbread cookies, and chocolate-chocolate chip cookies.

I've also been utilizing my wonderful ice-cream maker more often, now that I have a giant chest freezer where I have room to freeze my ice-cream maker's core. This means I can spontaneously make ice cream whenever I want!

Yes, my ice-cream maker is sitting on a washing machine. We put it in the laundry room because it makes too much noise.

So that's been our exciting life for the last month. Awesome, I know.

One somewhat exciting piece of news is that I am ridiculously close to being done with my student teaching! Unfortunately, the stress of finding a teaching job has kind of put me in a funk these last few weeks. My funk has, of course, led to more Gilmore Girls, magazines, and books. But I'm trying to remain optimistic about job prospects. It's only April, after all!

Finally, we can't seem to go more than a few weeks in my family without a birthday to celebrate. This time we had a little joint party for Matt's and George's birthdays. We planned to barbecue in the beautiful sunshine, but Colorado decided to give us typical April weather: while it was 84 degrees a mere 24 hours before our party, it was snowing and 30 degrees at barbecue time. Of course, that didn't deter us.

Snow. Not much fun to cook in, but totally worth it.

Birthday festivities, kids decorating cookies, and playing Apples to Apples.

It's always fun to get together with my family, and it helped to get me out of my funk for a little while. If I keep doing fun things like going out with family and friends, I can hopefully stay chipper and make it to summer!

Love and Baking: Salem's Wedding, Part 1

Oh, little blog. You are so neglected. Life just goes too fast sometimes. But I'm sure you're all used to my belated posts by now, so I'll just carry on.

A few weeks ago, my eldest sister got married! George and his sons have been a part of our family for a while now, but it was nice to make it all official. And it was lots of fun to celebrate their now-completed family.

Of course, Salem first had to enjoy her last few days of "freedom" with a bachelorette party!

Dinner at Armida's, karaoke, and Just Dance 2. Good times!

Girl time is certainly important, but the main event was the wedding itself.

Getting ready for the ceremony.

We were very sad that my grandparents were unable to attend because my grandmother had a health scare just before the wedding. Luckily, Matt got into techie mode and set to work making sure they could see the ceremony. He ended up streaming live on the internet so that Grandma and Grandpa could watch from the hospital. It was great for other extended family members to watch, too! And I'm happy to say that Grandma is doing better.

Overall, it was a beautiful ceremony that was especially cool because it was the joining of a whole family. If only the baby hadn't whined the entire time. Oh, well. I guess it's to be expected of a two-year-old.

The awesome videographer, the little wedding-disruptor and me, and a beautiful wedding - complete with group hug!

After the wedding, we had parties galore! I mentioned in previous posts that I was "catering" (using the term loosely there) the dessert reception. I spent a lot of time practicing and perfecting recipes, and I had grand ideas of how the whole thing would turn out. I had visions of perfect sweets and pictures worthy of the blogs and websites that I often spend hours salivating over. Of course, I didn't realize how difficult it is to remember to take pictures of the baking process while stressing about getting everything done by a deadline. And good food photography also requires a good camera, a decent editing software (and ability), and great natural light in the kitchen. I don't really have those things. But maybe I will someday.

Anyway, I hope to do a post with my mediocre pictures of the baking, along with recipe details. That is, if anyone will be interested in reading it. But for now, here's the final product!

Sugar free cheesecakes with raspberry drizzle; chocolate amaretto balls rolled in cocoa, powdered sugar, chopped almonds, and sugar crystals; raspberry lemon bars; and mini cheesecakes topped with sweet sour cream topping, brown sugar raspberry sauce, and chocolate caramel drizzle. Not pictured: sea salt caramels.

The whole dessert table.

I feel pretty good about the way it all turned out. It was a lot of work (more than two solid days of cooking), but I think things were pretty tasty.

Of course, it was a wedding, so my desserts had to share the spotlight with the wedding cake. I would have been bitter about sharing my moment (not really), if the cake wasn't so awesome!

Beautiful! And yummy, too!

The cake was made by my aunt, and it had so many great details. Salem and George met through music, and it's a major part of their lives, so that was the theme of the cake. And there were models of every family member - including the pets!

The music was the theme from the Brady bunch, and Ellen even included a model of Gypsy, the dog that is still a part of the family in spirit. Plus, the happy couple at the top of the cake.

The reception continued with all the fun events usually found at a reception. And there was also a big party the following night to celebrate. But I'll have to post about those later (soon, I hope!).

I'll leave you with a final look at the happy family, finally complete!

Love. Awesome.

Oh, January...

January is my least favorite month. The holidays are over, it's freezing cold, and there's not much to look forward to in the way of holidays and events. However, our foray into the world of snow sports, along with various fun events with family and friends, has made January a little more bearable. And here we are, already entering February. Just like that.

We've continued our frequent ski weekends this month, and I've enjoyed trying out my super cool Burton snow pants that I got for Christmas.

Having fun at A-Basin.

Thanks to my friend, Rachel, we've broadened our view of the hockey world. Rachel graduated from the University of North Dakota, which is apparently a huge hockey school. The alumni association was having a party downtown to watch the UND Sioux battle their rivals: the Minnesota Gophers! Matt and I tagged along and had a good time pretending to be Sioux fans.

Go Sioux! Can you tell that I'm not quite as enthusiastic as Rachel?

Woohoo! Go Sioux!

Birthday parties certainly help push away the January blues. My family gathered to celebrate the births of one of my nieces and one of my aunts. The little one loved being the center of attention, and she was even very gracious in sharing her spotlight.

Birthday fun. The baby had a hard time dealing with the fact that she didn't get to open any presents.

And, of course, I've been spending a lot of my free time practicing and perfecting the recipes I'll be using for Salem's wedding in a couple of weeks. After trying a variety of treats, we've decided on the menu: mini cheesecakes with three different toppings (sour cream topping, chocolate-caramel drizzle, and brown sugar raspberry sauce), chocolate amaretto truffles (rolled in cocoa, powdered sugar, or slivered almonds), and raspberry lemon bars. Plus I'll be making some sea-salt caramels to go alongside the crackers and peanuts set at each table. My recipes are pretty simple, but I really want everything to turn out perfect.

Baking.

I hope to take pictures of the big three-day baking process, but I'm sure I'll be a little frazzled and forget. I'll definitely get some pics of the final spread at the wedding. Hopefully, the finished products will be pretty (and tasty) enough to meet approval of the bride (and groom, of course)!