Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Ahhh...life

Well, life has been a little busy lately. More like A LOT busy. This semester is kickin' my butt and it just started! :( Wahaha boo hoo. Anyways......as I drove home from work last night, I was thinking about all of the crap that I had to do....."Eww" was the only phrase I could think of to describe it. As I was thinking, my husband calls and explains that he is taking a break from work to head home and start cooking some dinner-YES!!! One thing checked off my list! Thank you husband. So, I get home, enjoy a fabulous meal that I didn't make :) and then it's back to work for the hubs. :( As my husband leaves, I look around and see by backpack calling to me "you have a paper to write, two GIANT chapters to read, and a quiz to take tonight...you better get started" Then I see (and smell) the disgusting pile of dishes in our sink...the dishes didn't have to call to me...the aroma enveloped the entire basement. Meanwhile, my body is telling me "get on the elliptical you big tub of goo!" And this my friends...this is the moment where I said "NO!" And it was liberating. I'm NOT doing homework right now. I'm NOT doing the dishes. I'm NOT going to exercise!...I'm going to make sugar cookies!!! :) So I did. And this was the fabulous reslut of my decision. Sugar cookies with four different flavors of icing to choose from. Blue-vanilla, pink-strawberry, purple-raspberry, and yellow-pineapple. Possibly the best decision ever made??? I think so.
So I made my cookies, devoured several of them, took some to share with my family, had a nice de-stressing discussion with my Mother-in-law, came home, and THEN tackled my homework. Did I have to stay up later than anticipated to finish my homework? Yes. Did I get the dishes done? No. (they'll be the first thing I do when I get home, trust me :)) Was it worth it? YES!!

The Castle Cake

This past weekend was Calee's 2nd birthday. Megan and I got this cool castle cake set for Christmas so we thought that this would be the perfect opportunity to make a castle cake. It has been awhile since I have had the time to make a cake so this was a lot of fun....and A LOT of work. This cake took us about 9 hours to make. So this was basically our Saturday activity...and I loved it! This one was so much fun to make and with the exception of a few problems, the construction of the cake went smoothly. What do you think?We brought the cake out to my grandmas house on Sunday to celebrate. WOW...that was one interesting 30 minute ride. It went a little something like this......

Megan: "that tier is tilting the wrong way...THAT TIER IS TILTING ASHLEY!!!"
Ashley: "DON'T put your hand there! You'll ruin the flowers!!!"
Megan: "My arm is getting tired. Can you hold this tier for a little bit?"
Both: "AHHHHH! Dave!! Try NOT to hit the pot holes ok???"
Ashley: "OK, now MY arm is getting tired."

Yeah....it was a stressful drive. Thankfully for us, Dave was able to drive while we held the cake like it was a ticking time bomb. Unfortunately for him, he had to listen to us scream practically the whole way there. (love you babe!) Surprisingly, we only had a minor fatality on the way there that was easily fixed.

The cake was a success. And was delicious...red velvet cake, with homemade custard filling with raspberry. YUM!

Brewer

Carlie got a new chorkie puppy last week. His name is Brewer and he is TINY!!! I didn't think my family would EVER have a dog...mainly because of Megan's literal TERROR of dogs. :) But, amazingly, my parents allowed it. It has been quite the adjustment in our house but he has been fun. What hasn't been fun is trying to train him ;). He's so sweet though it's hard to get mad at him. I've never been much of a dog lover, but I can't help but love this little guy. The puppy adventures begin!!
lol. I absolutely LOVE this picture of my mother. She looks thrilled! ;)



Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Snowboarding

We went snowboarding with Adam and Beth on Saturday night up at Wolf Mountain. It was so much fun. I haven't been snowboarding for several years, and Dave and I had never been together so it was nice to go. Here are some pictures from the night. Dave and I. I finally got a smile out of him! I look sickly or something. I think I have a little jaundice. hmmmm-yellow skin around the eyes....probably not a good thing.
This was taken right before we left. Night boarding is so much better than during the day. FAR less busy.

Adam and Beth

Monday, January 4, 2010

Back to the Old Grind

Well, my break is officially over. It was wonderful! I spent so much time with family, caught up on some MUCH needed sleep, spent an amazing week in New York, ate way too much good food, (got an elliptical machine for Christmas to lose all of the weight that I gained from said food), spent some quality time with the hubs, started a 1500 piece puzzle....probably wont finish it until next Christmas, and I got to see this amazing chica!.....My dear friend Krystal!

She heads back to Minot, ND tomorrow, but it was so great to get to spend some time with her.

Class started this morning and it's back to the old grind. I'm ready for the crazy, busy life of school and work.....I think ;)

New Years Eve

We had a low key New Years Eve at our house with friends and siblings. We played games and ate WAY too much food. It was a fun night! Here's to 2009! What a great year!Jayce and Dave livin' it up ;)
Katie fell asleep before midnight....mike's gettin' there. :)

Carlie and Dave....Carlie was getting tired as well :) LOL

Carlies "Special" new years eve cup. Mike looks thrilled about the new year!

Christmas 2009

We had a wonderful Christmas this year. It was pretty busy as usual, but wen enjoyed spending time with family and just being together. We had the annual Christmas Eve party at my Grandma and Grandpas house, and then we went to Dave's parents house to watch "A Christmas Story"...LOVE that movie. Christmas morning, we headed over to the Bland's house to open presents, and then later back to our house to open presents with my family. The rest of the day was spent in Logan and North Ogden at family parties. We were pretty exhausted by the end of the day, but it was wonderful! Here are some pictures from the festivities. I didn't take a lot of pictures this year...I was too busy enjoying myself.Cute Calee laughing at her binky...love her

The fam just chillin....

Cambree showing us her song that she learned in kindergarten.

Dave and I. I've accepted the fact that Dave doesn't smile for pictures.

Girls New York Trip

WOW... I took A LOT of pictures!!! This will be my LAST post on New York. We really had so much fun while we were there and we felt so blessed that we were able to go and just to be together. Here are just some random pictures that were taken throughout the week. If you got through all of the New York posts, congratulations to you....if you skipped them, I don't blame you. ;)The view from our hotel, which was gorgeous, by the way.

Carlie on the subway

Megan and I on the subway

Me and the tree at Rockefeller Square. This tree was HUGE!

Carlie, Me, and Megan


A lot of the buildings had these giant snowflake lights on them. It was really pretty.

The tree in our hotel lobby.

Carlie and I on our way to Hoboken.

Carlie and her new friends, the street dancers.

The lonely panda bear that wandered around the city.

Mom and Megan on the way to Hoboken.

Carlie and I

The Temple

Carlie waiting for the subway

Carlie and I in the Swatch store.

This was taken the last night of our vacation at "Wicked"! Which we loved! We got in trouble for taking this picture in the theatre so it is the only one I have from that night.

Central Park

Here are a few pictures from Central Park. Enjoy!
Carlie and I in our hats that we had just purchased. It was FREEZING!

Carlie, Megan, and Me

Yay! Megan is looking a little worried because there was a dog right behind my mom as she was taking the picture...lol, funny Megan.

My cute mom in her new hat.

Carlo's Bake Shop

One of the days that we were in New York was Megan's 16th birthday. The only thing she wanted to do was to go see Carlo's Bake Shop in New Jersery. So, we hopped on the subway and headed to Hoboken, NJ to see it. This is where "Cake Boss" is filmed so she was pretty excited.Carlie in front of the shop
All the beautiful cakes. Someday I will own my own bakery and Megan and I will make the most beautiful wedding cakes around.

Drool ;)
Fruit made out of marzipan

Megan trying to decide what kind of goodies she wants for her birthday.

We each got a canoli and my goodness! Yum! Thanks for the suggestion Tina!!

Me devouring my canoli.


Me, Carlie and Megan. This place was full of goodies and we did not leave empty handed. $70.00 (yeah, in know) worth of pastries later, and you have four VERY happy women! YUM!

This is the beautiful tiramisu that my mom got.