Caution: Contents Under Pressure

Don't ask me how, but I do believe I caught the chicken in my pressure cooker on fire the other night. Normally I throw a frozen chicken breast or two in the cooker and they are ready to be shreaded up for dinner about 8 minutes later and it is so cool, but this night something wasn't normal. I don't know what went wrong but the pressure cooker was steaming weird and when I tried to cool the lid with cold water the pressure indicator would drop, but then go right back UP! So I knew their was a heat source coming from inside the pressure cooker - and since it smelled like fire, I figured it could be!!

So I thought of my friend Beth whose kitchen caught fire not long ago and I was determined to prevent that so I carried the thing with hot pads out front and set it on the cool concrete. At that point I got my camera because I wanted proof to show Tyler that all this really happened and I took pictures of myself spraying the hot pot with the hose!!

Finally the pressure indicator dropped down and stayed down so I knew the thing was cooler inside and was safe to open up. Right about then was when Tyler pulled up front and we laughed when I told him what was going on. Upon opening up the pot, this is what we found. Disgusting! And we dinner ate out at Quiznos not too long after.

I still don't know what happened and but I do know that I hope it doesn't happen again next time. Gross! Charred Chicken!

Paradise.

As I mentioned earlier, this week is our 9 year wedding anniversary! I just can't believe how quickly time has flown by and how far we've come since the Villa Maria apartments in Provo, all day classes at BYU and splurging on a nice dinner out at Taco Bell! :) It seems like just yesterday.

Our one year anniversary has gone down in history as a royal bust, Tyler went skiing on a PwC recruiting trip and came home sick and feverish with the flu. I think I had dinner and a movie waiting... but we just went to bed. Ever since then he has been committed to celebrating our anniversaries in style, and it has become one of our favorite traditions.

This year we decided to stay in town and drove about 40 minutes up to Scottsdale. The resort we stayed at was way nicer than we anticipated, it felt like Paradise - and in our own backyard!! (think of the big bucks saved not flying or driving anywhere!) We thoroughly enjoyed the down time.






Our ride. J/K



The next day we had my mom bring the kids up in the afternoon to swim with us. We were just so excited about the place (warm pools!) that we didn't want the kids to miss it! :) Then we went to dinner with Luke and Ashley on the way home (grandma took wild Jake in her car). It was the end to a perfect little getaway!

"Bread, bread, bread, bread, bread."

This weekend before we took off on my mom she taught me how to make this bread that uses no eggs or oil, just Soy Lecithin. I guess it is the big rage up in Utah right now because it is so good for food storage reasons (lecithin has a 5 years shelf life) so she brought me all the stuff I needed to get started and we had fun playing around with the recipies. The creator's blogsite is www.howtomakebread.blogspot.com But anyway, we ate our weight in bread the past four days; cinnamon braids, rolls, garlic breadsticks, wheat bread, jelly rolls, etc. I feel like the pillsbury dough-boy. But I appreciate having this knowledge because you can make white or wheat bread with it and so many good treats.







P.S. There's a story that goes behind the title of this post. When we were dating Tyler had a very large roommate who was a food science major who LOVED food. Almost everyday he made bread in his bread machine and when the little bell would go off indicating that the bread was ready he would jump up and, in a very womanly way, say "bread bread bread bread bread!" It was too much. And, he never shared.

'Two Sisters, One Heart' Fun Run

I decided to sign our family up to run in something special for Valentine's day. There are two little girls (two years old) who are conjoined twins, sharing a heart and liver, who live nearby. The community was doing a fundraiser for them to pay for a possible upcoming surgery or continued medical costs. We ran in the one mile fun run, and got to start out right next to the girls, Taylor and Emma! Tyler pulled Jake and Ash in the wagon and Luke and I ran and walked. It was great. A sweet activity perfectly appropriate for the day of love! :)

A date with my love.

Since our anniversary comes only ten days after Valentine's day we usually trade who takes who out for each event. This year I treated Ty to a Valentine's date and we went up to the Tempe Marketplace to eat at California Pizza Kitchen and play some games at Dave and Busters. It was something I knew he would enjoy and we had fun! And with the NBA all-star stuff going on right in town things were definately happening - lots of people!

Here are some pics:

Shortsales can be slow.

Just a note to let friends know that we are still working on getting the house. With a short sale each step takes longer and the bank tends to take its sweet time. We did originally state that we could move in on Feb.28th however I now know that that date will never happen. We are most likely looking at mid-late March or even later if there are hang ups. It's cool though. We aren't in any big hurry until the heat arrives and we are ready for a pool again! So that's what's going on with that. I'll keep things posted here as they unfold.

This one's for Nana and Grandma

WE LOVE YOU!

Keeping things Exciting

Since word is going to start traveling soon I want to share the news myself and show a few pictures of OUR NEW HOUSE!! Yes folks, we bought a new place and it's right here in good old Arizona! (Cortina - a neighborhood 2 or 3 miles from here)

Everything about this 'house swap' of ours has been crazy. The fact that we put our old house up in the first place, how quickly it sold, the rental we were lucky to get, and this new house! Life has been up in the air, but it's all good. And for those wondering what happened to us getting to Utah, we've had to put that on the back back burner. Once we moved out pf our other house and assessed the situation with the economy we just couldn't feel right about quitting a good job to get there. Our families are going to have to wait (or move here!!). :)

So my latest hobby has been to access the MLS under Tyler and use his lockbox key to go into vacant homes. I walked into this one by myself Tuesday and as Tyler puts it "I began to foam at the mouth!" The house is exactly what I have dreamed about!! And as a shortsale the price was right, we just had to move FAST. So here it is Thursday and we already got it. We are in the inspection period now for ten days and things can still change so this isn't a done deal but we'll see.

If things go the way they are expected to, we move in Feb. 28th... three and a half weeks! I'm telling you, things have been wild. Enough talk, here are the pics.

BUT, I do also want to say how much we are going to miss the great people in this ward and specifically the awesome neighbors in HIGH 5. So many good friends we've made in the last 5 years.

Kitchen
Entry
Patio from familyroom
The kicker - stairs to the basement
The basement mini-kitchen
The park around the corner
Backyard

Rough Weekend

This weekend was rough. We started out with big plans to go to the gym Saturday morning, go on a little family hike that night and then watch the Cardinals win the Superbowl on Sunday. However, when I woke up Saturday morning and dedided to make some new egg omlette things that I'd been craving, I blew it. I put a metal handled pan in the oven to bake the eggs, pulled it out after twenty minutes and then absent mindedly went to move it with my bare hand just seconds later and I BURNED MY HAND SO BAD!!

I have burned my hand many times before, ran it under cold water and moved on. But this was different. It hurt SO bad!! It stung and stung and stung. I got blisters down the middle of my hand, on the inside part of my fingers and on the tip of my middle finger. And when I took my hand off ice it heated right back up into a painful burn again - for the whole day! No fun.

The way I descibed it to people was that my hand felt like it does when you spread Elmer's glue on your hand and let it dry (tight and weird) but like the Elmers glue was acid or something just stung the skin all day. It was bad. The omlettes weren't worth it.

We skipped the gym, skipped the hike. I ended up on some pain killers and with a nap. Sunday the Cardinals lost in a sad and heartbreaking way. And I ended that night by pulling a tupperware of taco salad out of the fridge, the lid popped off and the salad sprayed all over the kitchen (floor, fridge, walls). Not the best of weekends, but we're over it and my hand it fine now. You win some, you lose some. That's my new motto.