Christmas Decorations!

I was so excited to decorate for Christmas this year! It's something that's exciting and different and that's just what I needed. We didn't bring our Christmas tree with us to NYC because of the storage space needed and I didn't think it would be a big deal without a tree. I decided we needed some sort of a Christmas tree. I bought a little 2 ft tree at Target and that will be our tree for the next 4 years. I really like it, and the best part is it comes in a little tiny box that will be easy to store. Here are some pictures of the rest of our decorations so far. There isn't much because I thought that I had packed more than I did. I forgot to pack our stockings so we don't have those...

This is the nativity that Scott brought back for me when he went to Africa. It's really cool, it's one of my favorite decorations we have.

I had this idea of wrapping some of our frames on the wall like presents. I like it, hopefully it's not too weird

Catch up!

I'm going to play blog catch up since it's been a while. Sometimes the problem isn't that there isn't anything going on but too much going on that it gets overwhelming to blog about. This post is going to be a little this and that to catch everyone up.

Most recently... it was Thanksgiving! Most of Scott's family came into town so we got to hang out with them.

We went to the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade. It was really fun! We got there super early so we were on the front row! Here are some pictures:

Dora The Explorer

Buzz Lightyear
Smurf

Santa! He was very excited to see us!

We also went to the Statue of Liberty
and... Ellis Island
We went to the Radio City Christmas Spectacular and saw the Rockette's

Looked at decorated windows

Got our pictures taken with the Macy's Santa

Rode the subway a lot

Central Park of course! We saw the Belvadere Castle there---it was cool!

View of NYC from the castle

We did a lot of fun things over the Thanksgiving Break and also made our first Thanksgiving dinner.... it was a lot of work! I appreciate Thanksgiving Feasts a lot more now. It was a tiring time, but we are recovered now.

Mandoo, Knicks Game, and a Lung Transplant...makes for an exciting night!

We had tickets to the Knicks vs. Jazz game Monday Night at Madison Square Garden. We decided on our way to the game that we should try out a Korean restaurant called Mandoo. Mandoo is the Korean version of potstickers, or Gyoza. Here's the sign, you can't see it very well.The front of the restaurant. It was a small little place but nicer than what I was expecting.Here's Scott eating a side dish of turnips while waiting for our mandoo. We ordered the pork and vegetable Mandoo--it was really good!

We ordered Bulgogi Bi Bim Bop for our main course. I think that's what it was called or something like that--Scott would know but he's not here to correct me right now :) It's rice with a bunch of vegetables a little meat, some egg, and some red pepper sauce. It came to our table sizzling and our server mixed it all up for us. He asked how spicy we wanted it, Scott said medium so it wouldn't be too hot for me but it still was pretty spicy, but good!
Then... off to the Knicks game! When we got to the game we had to keep going up all these escalators because our seats were at the very top. I thought we were going to be so high up but we really weren't. It's not like the delta center (ESA now) where it's pretty steep, it's just wider. So we actually had better seats than we thought---yay for cheap seats that you can still see from! We were excited to see the Jazz play! (no we didn't go to see the Knicks)
A picture of us in our seats

Right before the game

Scott with his binoculars---it was cool to look through them it was like you were sitting right on the court:)
A Canadian Flag was hanging right by the US Flag. I took a picture for my brother Cam on his mission in Canada--it made me think of him:) Yay Canada!On the way to the game I told Scott, I hope we see someone famous at the game... and we did! During a break in the game. The theme song to The Office started playing and there was a picture on the big screen of Kevin from the office and then it changed to a video of him in his seat at the game! I was excited! We looked through the binoculars until we found him. Sure enough we found him--and I took a picture from our seats. See it below, he's the guy with the bald head. We didn't get to meet him because he was seated in the special section and we weren't but I still think it was pretty cool!

So about the game---The Jazz were ahead by a good lead the whole time until the last quarter. At the end it was tied up and stressful... but... the Jazz ended up winning by 2 points! Yay! Good ending!

After the game we wanted to get out as fast as we could to avoid the crowds. As soon as the game ended we opened the door to the stairwell and ran down the stairs instead of taking the escalators. We got out so fast! A piece of advice--the stairs are quicker, most people won't use them. We got to the subway stop and we hear beeping coming from Scott's pocket.

Side Story: Scott's been holding a pager that the medical students rotate through carrying. It's a transplant pager so if a transplant needs to happen at the hospital whoever has the pager will get paged and get to go watch the transplant.

Back to the story....

Scott pulls out the pager and it's going off. We have to stop before going through the Subway gates for him to call the hospital. He talked to them and found out he needed to be at the hospital in an hour and he'd be watching a lung transplant. We rushed home, he changed into scrubs and he left to go. This was about 11:00 pm so I went to bed. At 6:00 am I get a call from Scott asking me to open the door. Needless to say, Scott didn't get much sleep last night:) I'll have him write all about it when he has some time.

Yeah...last night was a crazy night!

Productive Day So Far!

When you don't have a real schedule it's hard to stay focused and be productive....it's very easy to put things off. But, today is an exception! I got up showered, did the laundry, made a new recipe and put it in the oven for lunch (I made dinner for lunch since Scott will be home for lunch and not dinner), and it's only 12:00:) I feel proud that I got going right off this morning---usually it takes me a while to get going. I should keep this pace and get more stuff done!

Crockpot Steak Over Potatoes

This is a really good and easy recipe! The ingredients seem sort of strange but just try it!

Crockpot Steak Over Potatoes

Ingredients:
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 cup apple juice
1 pouch Lipton onion soup mix
1 tsp. celery seed
1 pkg. stew meat

Cook on high for 2 hours, low for 1 hour. Serve over mashed potatoes.

Bad at Blogging

Our life is mostly the same everyday now....at least mine. I think of things to blog about but have been bad at doing it. I feel like my life is very boring and so I haven't been blogging much. I'm going to start anew and start blogging again. I guess it really hasn't been that long, just a week or two but I feel like since I'm behind it's hard to start going again. I'm going to blog about previous things that have happened to catch up! Stay tuned...

Caramel Fondue

Here is a recipe for a caramel dip/fondue. It's really good to dip fruit, brownies, pretzels, popcorn, etc. It's really easy, try it out!

1 stick butter
20 Lg. Marshmallows
1 bag kraft caramels (use kraft, the off brand is hard to un-wrap)
1/2 C whipping cream or canned milk


Melt butter in fondue pot, then add mellows, caramels, and milk. Stir until melted. Enjoy!


If you don't have a fondue pot just do it on the stove top it will work just as well.

Legend of Sleepy Hollow

We took a day trip to Sleepy Hollow, NY today - we had lots of fun with our friends, and there wasn't any rain (but only because we hauled our umbrella around everywhere). It was such a quaint little town, and very different from the city! There were a bunch of locally-made holiday decorations lining the streets and parks of the town.

The jack-o-lantern man
Everybody non-posing in the middle of the city's gigantic cemetery. I think this is their version of Central Park. I would definitely spend a lot of time here if I lived in Sleepy Hollow - but it might be strange with all of the dead people around.

Trying my hand at some scenic pictures.
Graveyard for Washington Irving and family. Too bad the gate was locked, or else I would have gotten a closer picture. I just realized I probably could have climbed over the fence...but I'm glad I didn't. I don't need any headless horseman curses.
Here we are on the infamous bridge of Sleepy Hollow - great fall activity with lots of fun people!
- Scott

Day & Night

I've had these photos for a while now, but haven't had time to post them until now. We are fortunate to have an apartment that sits just next to the Hudson river, just south of the George Washington Bridge. When we drove here from Utah, our route basically consisted of this:

Get on I-80
Drive East for 2000 miles, give or take a few.
Continue on I-80 until it ends and turns into the George Washington Bridge
Cross the bridge, turn right, and drive 1/2 mile to our apartment

Needless to say, we have an amazing view of the bridge, the river, New Jersey, and a slice of the NYC skyline.



I saw this while eating breakfast one morning as the sun was rising, and thought it was worthy of a picture.

At night, with the lights, the bridge lights up (as well as our apartment - a nice little nightlight). On special occasions, they light up the pillars on either side of the bridge - but then it gets a little TOO bright...

Sunsets are beautiful while eating dinner - except when the sun reflects off the surface of the river at just the right angle. It's like the river becomes the sun...and we go blind...but only for a few minutes.

- Scott

We bought our tickets...

To fly to home to Utah for Christmas!

Scott and I finally purchased tickets to go home for Christmas. We were trying to wait until I got a job to make sure I could get the times off. But, I haven't gotten a job yet so we decided to buy them before they got too expensive. I heard that plane tickets go cheaper on Wednesday mornings so I compared the prices each day to see. Sure enough this morning the plane tickets we wanted dropped in price so we bought them. We will be in Utah for almost 2 weeks---I am excited! So...if you live in Utah, see you in a couple months!

Salisbury Steak Recipe

I was trying to think of what we could make for Sunday Dinner and I realized we had a lot of hamburger. I went online and googled recipes with hamburger and this is what I found. I made it and it ended up being really good!

1/2 cup minced onion
1 clove garlic minced
1 1/2 tablespoons butter
1 1/2 pounds ground beef
2 eggs
1/2 cup bread crumbs
2 tablespoons fresh chopped parsley (I just used dried, and sprinkled it in until it looked good)
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour

Saute onions and garlic in 1-1/2 tablespoons butter until translucent and set aside. Mix beef in bowl with eggs, bread crumbs, parsley, and cooled onion mixture. Form mixture into 6 patties and saute in pan with 1 tablespoon of butter until golden brown on both sides. Set aside in a casserole dish. Patties should still be pink inside.

Melt 2 tablespoons butter in pan and add 3 tablespoons flour. Cook 1 minute and whisk in 1-1/2 cup beef broth. Pour over patties in casserole.

Bake at 350 for 30 minutes

Yield: 6 Servings

I served this dish with mashed potatoes, Yum!

2012 - Adam Lambert

If you like Adam Lambert check this out! His song is going to be on the movie 2012 coming out. I think that's pretty cool!

2012 - Adam Lambert Music Teaser - Moviefone

Recipes I've Made Lately

I made these recipes lately and really liked them! I love finding recipes that are good and would like to share them. I found these recipes online.

Artichoke Chicken
Ingredients:
8 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
2 tablespoons butter
2 jars (6 ounces each) marinated quartered artichoke hearts, drained
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1-1/2 teaspoons dried rosemary, crushed
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
2 cups chicken broth

Directions:
In a skillet, brown chicken in butter. Remove chicken to an ungreased 13-in. x 9-in. baking dish; do not drain pan juices. Arrange artichokes on top of chicken; set aside.

Saute onion in pan juices; blend in flour, rosemary, salt and pepper. Add chicken broth; cook until thickened and bubbly. Remove from the heat and spoon over chicken.

Cover and bake at 350° for 50 to 60 minutes or until chicken is tender. Serve chicken with sauce.

Yield: 8 Servings


Chicken Tortilla Soup
Ingredients:
No-Stick Cooking Spray
8 6-inch corn tortillas
Salt
2 tablespoons Oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 cups cooked chicken, diced
1 can (15 1/4 ounces) whole kernel corn, drained
1 can (15 ounces) black beans, drained
1 can (15 ounces) diced tomatoes, with juice
1 can (4 ounces) chopped green chilies, drained
1 package (1 1/4 ounces) taco seasoning mix
2 cans (14 1/2 ounces) chicken broth
1 tablespoons lime juice
Shredded cheddar cheese
Chopped cilantro
Sour cream
Lime slices (optional)

Directions:
Spray a baking sheet and both sides of the corn tortillas with No Stick Cooking Spray. Slice the tortillas into strips; sprinkle lightly with salt. Place on baking sheet; bake for 12-15 minutes or until crisp and lightly browned. Set aside.

Meanwhile, in a Dutch oven or soup pot, heat Crisco Canola Oil over medium high heat. Add onions and saute until soft. Add chicken, corn, beans, tomatoes, chilis and taco seasoning; stir to combine. Add chicken broth; stir. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer, 10-15 minutes. Stir in lime juice.

To serve, place a few tortilla strips into soup bowl; ladle soup over. Sprinkle with cheese and cilantro. Top with remaining tortilla strips. Garnish with sour cream and a lime slice.

Family Visit

My parents and three of my siblings came out to visit us in NYC this past weekend! It was so fun to have them here! It was nice to be able to have something to do during the day. We did a lot of fun things, some things that I haven't done yet. We went to Lombardi's one night which is the original New York pizza place. It is really good! I got to go with my family on a shuttle tour while Scott was in class. It was fun to see a lot of the sights since I haven't seen some of them yet. My family got to see our apartment and neighborhood in Washington Heights. I'm sure if you ask any of them the will tell you that our neighborhood is quite different than Utah. We were able to go to a Dominican restaurant with them which they all enjoyed. The restaurant is called El Malecon which is just a short walk away. We also walked across the Brooklyn Bridge which was really cool! I'll have to go do it sometime at night. We went in the morning which was cool, but I think it would be fun with all of the lights. We went to Mary Poppins which was really good! The sets were cool! My brothers were also able to go to the Priesthood Session with Scott which they watched in the same building that the Manhatten temple is in. We did all of this in just a couple days along with a few more things I'm sure I missed! It was so good to see them! This weekend definitely wore me out---not used to doing that much in a short period of time. Now it is already getting boring around here. I miss them already! Come again soon!

Brrr, it's not too cold over here!

I thought it has been cold here in New York City being in the mid 50's to low 60's.... but, then I looked at the weather in Utah... 46 degrees today! Brr.... makes me cold just thinking about it. For all of you in Utah---I wish you luck!

Yay! More Mail!

It makes me so happy when I get something in the mail! It was a very pleasant surprise to see this envelope from my family in Utah.

What's inside the card?

School pictures of my little bro and sis: Cody and Courtney! These are going in a frame! I have good looking siblings--No fair they didn't have to go through an awkward stage like I did in Jr. High and High School. Love you family, thanks for the pictures!