Pre-Holiday Vacation

With multiple Thanksgiving and Christmas celebrations J and I get pretty exhausted. This year we decided to visit our neighbor to the South. Joe and I have been to some pretty exotic locations but neither of us have ever visited Mexico. We decided it was time! We stayed at the beautiful Marriott (of course) and were not disappointed.

We basically lounged by the pool for 5 days. We only left twice... to deep sea fish and to visit the town of Puerto Vallarta. Fishing was fun and we saw a lot of whales as well. It was a private charter, so I was able to stretch out a take a nap or 2 on the boat. I tell ya, waking up at 6 am is ridiculously early when on vacation (or really anytime for me nowadays).

"exploring" the town of Puerto Vallarta...

Adios Mexico! It was a lot of fun while it lasted...

Thanksgiving Recipe

I was in charge of making a Thanksgiving dessert for the celebration at my parent's house. It was our THIRD T-day meal and I thought I could use a reprieve from pumpkin pie (especially considering I don't even like pie... unamerican... I know... I know!). I made a Pumpkin Creme Brulee instead. I had purchased some Ikea ramekins more than a year ago and I have been itching to use them. It also gave me a good excuse to buy a fun kitchen torch! The recipe was much easier than it sounds and the best part is that it can be made in advance.

Pumpkin Creme Brulee (www.foodnetwork.com)

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1/4 cup light brown sugar
• 1/4 cup sugar, plus 4 teaspoons
• 8 large egg yolks
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon grated nutmeg
• 1 cup mashed cooked pumpkin

Directions

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.

Arrange 8 (1/2-cup) ramekins or custard cups in a large metal baking pan.

In a medium saucepan, combine the cream, brown sugar, and 1/4 cup granulated sugar. Bring to a bare simmer over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Remove from the heat.

In a medium bowl, whisk the egg yolks until frothy and lemon-colored. Slowly add 3/4 cup of the hot cream mixture, whisking constantly. Add the egg mixture to the remaining hot cream, and whisk. Add the vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, and pumpkin, and whisk until smooth. Strain through a fine mesh strainer into a large bowl. Divide among the prepared custard cups.

Add enough hot water to come halfway up the sides of the cups. Bake until the custards are just set in the center but not stiff, 45 minutes to 55 minutes. Remove from the oven and refrigerate until well chilled, at least 3 hours or overnight.

Sprinkle each custard with 1/2 teaspoon of the remaining sugar. Using a kitchen torch, caramelize the sugar. (Alternately, preheat the broiler, and broil until the sugar melts and caramelizes, watching closely to avoid burning and rotating the cups, about 1 to 2 minutes.) Place on small dessert plates and serve.

Pumpkin Carving!

Joe claims he has NEVER carved a pumpkin. I find this ridiculous so we had to change that!

MU Homecoming

Yes, I am aware that neither Joe or I are "technically" alumni of MU. Joe would have loved to finished is undergrad degree there but he still claims that UMKC is part of the U of Missouri system. I attended KSU but was never what you would call a true Wildcat. I am officially converted now :)

The homecoming game was covered by ESPN College Gameday. This is what you might call "kind of a big deal" because two 6-0 teams were playing each other. OU was ranked #1 and MU ranked #11. Obviously, Mizzou was the underdog which made the weekend that much more exciting!

This is a pic of the ESPN crowd. (I didn't take this pic)

The parade is also a very big deal in Columbia.

The ESPN trucks were a big hit!

This is the end of the game after MU knocked off OU (36-27).
Those crazy kids... rushing the field :)

The Reaction...

This is Mom's reaction when she drove up to the party. A little background: Mom thought that my sister was having some of her friends over to the house for their annual "farm party."

Shhhh... It's a Secret!

October has been a very busy month! It started with a bang by throwing my Mom a surprise 60th Birthday Party. It was a VERY big surprise because her actual 60th birthday is still months away. It is in the dead of winter and too close to the holidays to really have anything exciting so we tricked her by throwing it really early.

Everyone waited on the front porch for her to arrive. We had somewhere between 40 and 50 guests so, a great turnout.


Mom arrived with her sister who helped us to distract her with shopping and errands. My Dad happens to represent a product line that includes large sign boards. She didn't even notice the giant "Happy 60th Geri" sign in the background.


Her Mom, sisters, and childhood friend surprised her by driving down from Nebraska for the party!

The kiddos were very patient waiting all night for the cake :)

Master Bedroom Facelift

When we moved in to this house 2 years ago (wow... time flies!) the master bedroom was painted a goldish/yellow color. It is a perfectly fine color and not nearly has offensive as all the brass and navy carpet. We just didn't like the color. We bought the below bedspread for our queen bed to try to make it work for a few years. We didn't really like the bedspread but it was an affordable temporary fix to the problem.


We recently painted the room 'Iced Chocolate' by Valspar. We LOVE the paint+primer mix and only needed one coat (with a few touch-ups). We replaced the fan which was previously white and brass (shocker!). We purchased a king bed from overstock.com and mattress from costco. We have been very happy with both. The bedding is from Macys at about 75% off! I picked a very versatile wall color so I can change the bedding more often. I will probably look for a more spring-look sometime soon.