Long time no see

I hope to post more often, but life happens!

Zoey has found she loves snow. This was her first time in it. She sure had a good time!

Zach and I discovered Chicken and Gnocchi soup from Olive garden. After SEVERAL trips there we found our poor bank account was suffering so I decided to copy the recipe. It's still somewhat in the works, but this is what I have so far:

Amber's copy cat Chicken and Gnocchi
1 cup chicken breasts, cooked and diced (you can use a rotisserie chicken)
1 14 ounce can salt free chicken broth
1 quart half and half
4 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
4 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup celery, finely diced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup carrots, finely shredded
1 cup onion, finely diced
1-2 cup fresh spinach
1 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon parsley
1 pound potato gnocchi (you can sometimes buy this at the store)

Sauté the onion, celery, and garlic in a bit of butter and/or olive oil, over medium heat until the onion becomes clear-ish (Zach says when they turn into ghost onions)

In the soup pot add the flour and butter, and make a roux, let the butter and flour mixture cook for about a minute before adding 1 quart of half and half (I wonder if you can use half half&half and half milk. It was almost too much cream for me).

Into the roux/cream add in the onion, celery, garlic mixture, carrots, and chicken. Once the mixture becomes thick add the chicken broth (I had to boil it a bit before it became thick). Once the mixture thickens again, add the cooked gnocchi, spinach, and seasonings, simmer until soup is heated through. Don't overcook the gnocchi or it'll become mashed potatoes!

I also added 2 cubes of chicken and herb bullion in the end. I would have used "Better than Bullion" but I only had beef. It seemed to give it a bit more flavor. Also, the carrots turned the soup slightly pink. I suppose you can rinse them, but I figured that would kill their nutritional value.

Let me know how I could improve on this, if you have any ideas!

Zach's Story

We went to bed at around 0300. After dreams of Voldemort, pickles, flying guitars that could talk, and cupcakes we woke up at 0600. I lay in bed thinking "God please make it 0300 again. I got out of bed around 0620, made some oatmeal, and our day started. Poor Amber. I waited until Amber and her mom left to go to the doctor to shower, then stepped out to head to school. I had my bag, lunch, and even my work clothes... But the keys were still on the recently added hook near the door.

Thankfully our bikes were not locked up so I hopped on mine and rode for the rental office. Halfway there I realize that I forgot to air up the tires for the last... 2 months. After a long, quad-killing, ride I arrived out of breath. Thinking the door was locked I stood on the office porch for 5 minutes. Turns out it was not locked. I got the spare key, rode home, unlocked the house and almost locked the spare in the house, sans-keys. I managed to sacrifice a hand to prevent overwhelming stupidity.

I only arrived 35 minutes late for my first class. The teacher was cool about it. Turns out most of the homework group I was in did not show up... For one of them it was very understandable: If you have kids in public school in this area they are sick, or will be soon. School went well.

Work was another matter entirely. The guy who was to help me called off. Again. Again... He calls off 3-4 times a week. "It's medical, they can't fire me." Yeah, but they can stop scheduling you so that you can no longer come in and work on Sunday for that $1 premium. Seriously! Only day he works is the one on which he gets paid more. Way to forget that those other 4 days would have made you more money than that one!

People are idiots.

But it was all worth it when I learned Amber's surgery went well. She will be on her road to recovery for a while, but when it arrives life will go on. Heck... It's going on right now.

dress, hat, and matching bunny

My first little dress I crotched. I didn't use a pattern, so I have a feeling it might not fit a real baby. Maybe a baby doll?
This is the finished product. I added some ruffles to the arms to make them a bit longer and added the weird hat.
I had some yarn left so I decided to make my first little stuffed animal. The head is a bit crooked and the ears won't stay straight, but otherwise I consider it a success. Zach wants to name it, but we don't know a good name.

FINALLY!

So when Zach and I got married one of the many things I was thinking about was having children, so in preparation of having said child eventually I picked out fabrics for the baby quilt (sounded fun and could be an heirloom thing, maybe?). Literally 5 and change years later I put the quilt together and this is what it looks like :)

This is cool! You hang it by the flowery things on the crib and you can put stuff you might need in it. I was ridiculously excited when I finished it.

This is inspiration for my next project. I have no clue what it may be, but hopefully it won't take more than a few months :p

Zach's blanket

Zach picked the above color because it was the softest one, other than the monkey print which only had a yard left. I picked the below color because our couch is brown.

Zach started out cutting but quickly realized that cutting was irritating so I took over and he tied. I didn't mind cutting at all. Goes to show that we are a good match :)
He couldn't resist.

Baby Quilt

Start!

Done!

Pups at play.

Even though it was 78 degrees on a mostly black dog, she insisted on sitting on my lap....and drooling on me :/
lol such a big tongue.

Rocky

We have a new squirrel friend. He likes to get into my bird feeder and eat all the seeds so we gave up and just started buying super cheap bird food. He will get on my little hook and beg for food while we refill the feeder. We named him rocky because when he saw Zoey, he FLEW. lol

This is a puzzle Zach and I put together. We're kinda excited because it's the first puzzle we put together that wasn't missing pieces. YAY!

:)

Jericho,

What you are attempting is a fools errand. You are too much of one thing to remain, too little of the other to survive where you must go. If you attempt to stay the Hunters will seek you out and see you dead. If you go willingly it is with acceptance of your fate; When your father left his world for ours. his "people" felt dishonored, disgraced... betrayed. And they are not wrong. God speed.

Ashon

what a bug!

So I was wandering around the house and I looked outside. This is what I saw:

What kind of crazy bug is this? It was almost as big as my thumb!

My ugly garden

has hidden treasures...

I love it!

I like to try and take pictures of lightning even though I don't have the proper camera. I set it to take multiple shots and go back and see what I've got. Even though there was MORE than enough lightning, this is what I got:

HUGE bolt! The thunder was so loud you could feel it in your chest!

Comfortable?

I'll never understand an animals concept of comfy.

Vacation and things

So we went on our vacation. It was really fun while it lasted. I ended up getting hurt and we had to leave early.

I know it's almost September, but I am already thinking about Christmas! This year when we decorate our tree I thought it would be fun to send out these little wooden decorations to the family, and have them decorate them and send them back. So when you get them, the small snowflakes are for the nieces and nephews and the bigs ones are for the brothers/sisters. The different ones are for grandmas and grandpas. Decorate them any way you wish and send them back We'll send tags that attach to the string so we know who's is who! I'm so excited to have a family tree.

Zach @ Work

This week I was horrified to hear a customer offer to "squash that thing" for me. What was he talking about? A praying mantis nymph riding my shoulder. He was there for over an hour before I finally made him get off into a tree. It was hilarious! It took him a while to get used to me, but once he did he still did not like other people.

When other people would approach me he would rear up and start waving his claws at them menacingly. When, at last, I decided Amber would probably not appreciate such a creepy and crawly pet I took it to a tree. Once there he tried to hide in my shirt. When I tried to force him on to the branch he waited until I backed off enough that he could fall and fly on to me again. He finally gave up, though, and went where he belonged.

My crab is obsessed, my dog is weird, my teacher is a huge honkin' dork.

I am sure Amber will add pictures later but... I guess I will start by explaining the title, then get to what's been going on since last we posted. In order. Fair?

We got a fiddler crab and a loach for our tank because the last time we messed with the rocks we found out how messy it really is. Since we have been trying to set up the tank so the crab can get out of the water on occasion if it wants. Ever since our latest setup it has been spending the majority of it's time on the leaf we put in there for it to perch on.

Why is Shadow weird now? I was studying and playing music from Kingdom Hearts. When Shadow heard the intro, Dearly Beloved, he perked up and wagged his tail-stump. Then when the next track he started he cocked his head as though he had remembered something, and looked at Zoey with his hate-face on, hardcore. It took me a moment to remember why: Zoey ate our last PS2 controller. Seems Shadow liked that game a little too much.

My teacher is a dork because on an exam he had the following true/false question: "Your teacher could make a great living as a stand-up comedian." Do I brown-nose? No... Not in my nature to do so. Best to be honest and circle false. Could I lose point? Perhaps. Maybe this was discussed the day I missed class? But it is such an opinion-based question that it is not exam material. If I get it wrong I will argue it either way. Maybe this is just an opinion poll disguised as free points?

As for what we've been up to: Netflix and Halo3. Not to put too fine a point on it. We re-discovered the joys of XBox Live, started buying meats other than ground beef and chicken, and spent more money than we should have. Broke? No. Hurt our bank account enough to where Amber might not want me to talk investments and retirement funds right now? Definitely maybe.

In other news I had a neat idea in class and was writing it down. The teacher looked down and noticed this, but did not notice me noticing, and decided it was time to call on me. Without missing a beat I said "hold on a moment, don't want to lose this thought" finished writing it down (it only took literally 3 seconds) and started reading. Next time, find a "victim" who can only focus on one thing.

Techno Zoey dance dance dance

So as you may have already heard, we adopted a new little heathen...I mean puppy. She is about 3 months old and is almost as big as Shadow. She was dropped off on someone's doorstep and the people took her to their local no-kill animal shelter where she waited, contracted kennel cough, and was just plain sad. So we picked her up, got her microchipped, and are in the process of getting her all better. She and Shadow are getting along pretty well considering Shadow doesn't like other dogs due to being bitten by one. We made a smart move, it seems, by taking them to Herritage park and introducing them there by throwing around the ball. At first Shadow was completely oblivious to her and then he finally starting sniffing and she nipped at him. He didn't know what to think so I fed her a piece of hotdog and then him one...and ohh man. Every time she got a piece he KNEW he was getting one, so he seems to think SHE is the bringer of tasty things now. All that's important is that they get along, which they do...mostly.

Zoey started a new game called Keep Away from Shadow in which the thing being kept is his chewy bone. She has her own bone....and about 3 pig ears laying around, but she finds it more entertaining to take his and make him mad. Also, she is a HUGE bed hog. She'll take the bigger of the two beds, which is meant for a full grown lab, and streeeeeeeeeetttttttcccchhhhh across it making Shadow lay on the floor or the smaller hand-made pillow/bed. BTW if anyone has old pillows they're looking to get rid of, call us. I found they make EXCELLENT dog beds. Especially when you stuff some cedar chips in with the old pillow stuffing.

I love my new job

So because this weekend is a holiday, I get paid double time and a half for 8 hours, then I get paid 8 hours on Monday even though I don't work, and I get weekend pay, and I get my raise for being trained as a monitor tech. I am able to afford our camping trip this year! I'm SO EXCITED!! I've wanted to do this since I was a little girl.

Okay I should probably tell you where we're going. We are going to Lake Glendale Stables. Basicly for 3 days and 2 nights we get a horse and we can go riding all day. They'll lend us some saddle bags and we can pack food, find a cool cave, and eat lunch somewhere. The most technology we are going to have is our phones, which will be off for the most part to save the battery. There are no outlets where we're going :D

I can't wait!

Lemon Ice a la Amber

3/4-1 cup of fresh squeezed lemon juice
2-4 tbsp of lemon zest
3 1/3 cups sugar
1-2 tbsp of vanilla

put water and sugar in pot on high heat until dissolved and boil for 3-5 minutes
let cool 20-30 minutes
add lemon, lemon zest, and vanilla

pour it all into a shallow container, cover it, and put it in the freezer for about 2 hours

after 2 hours take the contents and put it into a blender and blend until slushy

transfer the slush back into the container and freeze for 2 more hours.

To serve, scrape the top off with a spoon into a bowl.

I haven't finished trying this out, but I will let you all know how it turns out and maybe post a picture of the finished product. I'm going to try and make a lemon-mint version where you let fresh mint leaves (since I have several of them growing wild) sit in the hot syrup while it cools for 20 minutes.

To get enough juice I used 2 medium lemons. Just so you know the original recipe called for only 2-3 tablespoons of lemon juice...I LOVE lemons so I'm making mine extra lemony :D

Pain.....everyone has it...except those with congenital insensitivity

So I took a lovely trip to ER a little while ago. I thought it would be just like going to work, but it was really weird. It gave me a chance to look at healthcare through a patient's standpoint. I really think it made me into a better person.

I know for sure I will NEVER stand by a patent's door and talk to them. I honestly used to do that so I could listen for call lights going off. My doctor did that and it was SO irritating. I felt like he didn't care.

In other news I finally got my new hula hoop! I haven't had the chance to upload the pictures because my computer is close to the end of it's life. My hoop is all sparkley and has blue traction tape on it so it stays on my hips a little better. I haven't gotten a chance to use it much because it hurts too much. Hopefully I'll get better and I will be able to use it. I tried to get shadow to jump through it but he's too scared. He'll just whine at it.

Happy...the happiest fish I know

So I work up at 0400 this morning for really no reason. We decide to have baked french fries for breakfast. I decide that today is just going to be weird. We get bored and it's raining outside. Like a true nelson, we decide to go to Wal-Mart ('cause that's what grandma nelson used to do daily). We walk around looking at stuff, then we walk past the pets department. I see this fish among the dead/ugly fish...looking at me. Then he begins to dance. I INSISTED we buy this fish, 'cause he's happy. I need happiness around the house, so we find one of the grumpy ladies that works in the area and tell her to pick him out. She gets him in the bag and he literally jumps for, what I can only assume is, joy (most fish die at walmart...wouldn't you be happy?). Even the grumpy lady smiles and says, "yeah that is one happy fish."

He loves me, you can tell:

I just imagine him saying, "HEY, HEY, hey...hey....hey.....I love you"

Springtime with Mr. Allerton

This is my second favorite place on Earth. Robert Allerton Park is so magical. We are going to try and go every season and take pictures of how it evolves.

Zach said, "at this point a nerd would say 'it looks like Edward and Bella should step out from behind a tree.'" Funny he thought of that before me (the Twilight freak)...

This is one of my favorite flowers. It smells like lilac.

I thought this flower looked cool.

Sometimes I just let my camera hang on my wrist by it's strap and let it take pictures. Sometimes it looks pretty darn good :p

I...love...daffodils

This is the pavilion of the golden Buddhas or something like that. I wouldn't go in because there was a rather large hornet's nest.

I am allergic to bee stings....but I can't help getting a picture of them. I like the way they look.

Zach's favorite part of the garden...the fu dogs.

After I took this picture Zach says, "I didn't make that face on purpose. That was my 'concrete is digging into my hand rather painfully' face."

Climbing isn't really my thing.

Zach knew a girl that insisted that violence and murder was exclusively a human trait. I'd just like to point out that there were vines all over the place, wrapped around dead and dying trees. Mostly the vine had put welts onto the trees. It looked pretty violent to me.

This little red flower taught me a lesson. It showed me that even in the ugliest of places there is beauty. You just have to look hard enough.

This is the "goldfish pond." This is the ugliest pond I've ever seen.

The exit of the fu dog garden.

A whole field of daffodils.

I dunno what kind of flower this is, but it sure looks cool.

This reminded me of a song by Nightwish called Meadows of Heaven.

Who doesn't want to live here??

there were hundreds of these in the reflection pond....tadpoles! I've never seen one before this.

I...love...koi. These ones are HUGE!

So beautiful...and hungry!

This is the exit of the Sunken Garden. When I was little I wanted to get married here. Maybe we'll do a vow renewal here. The recently restored the fish and wall (hence the shininess and whiteness).

Closeup of the guardian fish. Allerton found the design on top of a Japanese castle in Tokyo. Lords usually made them out of gold (like the originals to Allerton) and they thought it would guard their castle and it also signified the lord's importance.

Zach felt he was pretty important.

This is actually a double daffodil! I didn't know those existed.

Zach thought the fish looked thirsty.

He wanted me to kiss it...this is as close as he was going to get.

Full view of the Sunken Garden.

We found a secret little shack thing.

There were wildflowers EVERYWHERE!

This place is so magical...I can't wait til summer to go again!