Baking Day

From A:

Today has become a baking sort of day. 

I made a blueberry crisp for work tomorrow to celebrate birthdays.  Three of my co-workers (my entire department has eight people) have January birthdays within two weeks of each other.  What are the odds of that?!  Here's what the crisp looks like after baking:

I also made a sausage and spinach strata that I'll bake later in the day for dinner.  I haven't made this before, but considering what the ingredients are, it's got to be good.  The recipe calls for sausage, spinach, cheese, eggs, bread, milk, and some spices.  Here's what it looks like prior to baking:

In weather news, it has been gorgeous lately (lows around 50, highs around 75)!  We went out to the lake yesterday to walk around (and for J to scope out the best fishing spots).  This is my kind of January weather!

We're Famous!

From A:

Our awesome wedding photographer, Lindsay Osborne, has updated her website and it now includes photos from our wedding!  If you go to the "galleries" tab at the bottom of her home page, we have at least one photo in each of the galleries (except the fashion gallery).

Check it out:
http://www.lindsayosborne.com/index2.php

Cookie Update

From A:

For those of you wondering about the fate of our beloved Moravian cookies we opened yesterday, they're now gone.

If you've never tried Moravian cookies, we highly recommend them:

Warning: You will never be able to eat just one of these thin, crispy, delicious cookies.  Don't try to convince yourself otherwise.

Suh-weet Sweet Potatoes

From A:

We love sweet potatoes but were getting tired of the usual baked variety.  So for dinner tonight, we tried a new spin on the tasty veggie (and no, it doesn't involve marshmallows and other syrup-like gunk that's often added to sweet potatoes - gross).

Tonight was the premiere of J+A sweet potato fries.  And, they're very easy to make!  All you need is sweet potatoes cut into fry shapes (peel the potatoes first), some olive oil cooking spray, cinnamon, sugar, salt, and pepper.  Once you spray the fries with cooking spray, just give the fries a light sprinkling with all the spices.  Then, bake at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes.  Here are the fries going into the oven:

Are the fries good enough to have again?  J and I both vote "yes"!

We decided to pair our fries with sundried tomato chicken sausage and a spinach salad:

Dessert was Moravian sugar cookies that our aunt and cousins gave us for Christmas.  We held out 22 days before opening them (and now they're now half gone)!

What's for Dinner?

From A:

Chicken fried rice, one of J's specialties!

The dish consists of grilled chicken, sesame seeds, scrambled egg, rice, soy sauce, sesame oil, seasoned rice wine vinegar, red pepper flakes, and some sort of vegetable (J used broccoli since we had some in the freezer).  Here is J working on his masterpiece:

The finished product:

J with his meal in one of the Buddha Bowls we got for Christmas:

Missed it!

From A:

Our hopes of snow never came true yesterday.  As it turns out, there was snow SOUTH of Gainesville in Ocala, but none here.  Boo!  Here is the photo from our newspaper of the scene in Ocala:

That should have been us!

And, even with no snow, the wind chill this morning is 16 degrees.  16!  Thank goodness for ceramic heaters.

Snow in the Swamp?

From A:

Weather forecasts in Gainesville predict a chance for snow early tomorrow morning!  If we get snow, it will be the first time in 14 years that the area has seen a trace of snow.

We also broke a 1924 record low yesterday with a low of 22 degrees and may end up breaking a 1960 record for the most consecutive days with a temperature of 32 degrees or lower.

I doubt we'll look outside tomorrow and see this...

... but at least Gainesville will have a while before the weather feels like this:

Kerri and Andy's Wedding

From A:

Right before our Christmas vacation, we attended the wedding of our good friends Kerri and Andy. They had a beautiful beach wedding followed by a reception with dinner, dancing, and a fun photo booth. Here is one of the shots we took at the photo booth:

We're so happy for them and wish them all the best!

Breakfast in Bed

From A:

J has been working really, really hard on research for his thesis lately. So as a reward this morning, he got a surprise breakfast in bed!

The menu consisted of a split crescent roll topped with a fried egg, sliced banana, and chocolate soy milk:

T Bow?

From A:

Despite the misleading title, this post is not actually about Tim Tebow (imagine that!). It is, however, about something that is turquoise and has a bow, so there's where the title came from.

Continuing in J's routine of donating blood every 8 weeks, he recently made another donation. Although his vein was originally missed by the phlebotomist (how she managed to miss his huge veins I'm not sure) she later redeemed herself by creating the cutest arm wrap I've seen.

I give you the masterpiece:


The wrap was originally just just turquoise, but I sarcastically commented about how J often gets pink wrap and really likes it, so she added some pink for him. I don't think J was thrilled about the addition, but I thought it was cute!

Happy New Year!

From A:

It's 2010!!!

But, if you'll allow me to live in the past for a while, I'm excited to share the events of our Christmas vacation. We had a fun, festive holiday with J's family, complete with:

1. Expertly decorated homemade cookies. Rudolph ended up turning out the best, but who can deny the artistic talent used to create Santa Kruger? (Note: The original concept was for Santa to have white arms holding the brown reins guiding his reindeer. Unfortunately, it didn't exactly work out that way.)


2. Wine, of course! Although we were in Tennessee and North Carolina, we were still able to find a winery. Our skills from the trip we took to Napa Valley continue to pay off.


3. A tour of the Biltmore Estate with my big brother and niece. The house is just amazing, and the Christmas decorations made it especially breathtaking.


4. SNOW! It may seem like a routine winter occurrence for many, but we Floridians were very excited to see it (and play in it).