How I messed EVERYTHING up (A.k.a. How Pottery Barn Saved my life, and by my life I mean Andrew's Birthday Cake)

So many ways to start this one but I would like to add a disclaimer

DISCLAIMER: This blog post contains many kitchen applicance "name dropping". For those of you that think that may be a bit too pretentious I'll give you a short version of this probably going to be too long blog post....Andrew and I were "parents" this weekend....He turned 31 this weekend (HOORAY!)....I almost burned down our house...and it was only TODAY that I realized I did EVERYTHING wrong (that would have been more helpful to know YESTERDAY oh well...)

Okay so I'll start by saying that EVERYTHING may be a bit dramatic, but I did do my fair share of "mess-ups". I'll get to those soon, first off I would like to say CONGRATULATIONS to our friends Liz and Scott who had their third child, Benjamin this weekend. Scott was deployed and returned home a week early only to have his first baby boy born 1 day later! Perfect timing! Since we're friends with this awesome couple, Andrew and I had volunteered to watch their two adorable daughters during the night while Liz was in the hospital. We found out, PARENTING IS HARD! Not complaining, but moreso saying that in admiration for all those who are or have been parents. I mean I've baby sat before, but it's been a long time, I guess I forgot how tiring children are. (Where do they get their energy?) I would like to note that we think these were the easiest children to take care of given their respective ages (4 and 2). They are both EXTREMELY smart and very verbal, they can say what they want/need and understand what was going on, their mommy prepared them well.

(Swinging on Friday night)

We watched the girls Friday night and thought "Hey, we can do this! Just feed them, play with them, piece of cake!" (I know all you parents are chuckling by now....) Since we have Chloe and we didn't want to leave her alone at night (she would FREAK OUT) I stayed overnight with the girls so that they could sleep in their home and Andrew stayed at our house with Chloe. (Our friend is allergic to dogs hence we didn't bring Chloe with us for all of you that already devised that solution in your head). Saturday morning I had to go to work so Andrew came over and made the girls pancakes and then took them over to another friend's house to play for the day. 

I got off work and Andrew and I were planning on going out that night but decided that we didn't have time because we were responsible for the girls that night so we just went to the gym (it had been a few days and we NEEDED it), ate dinner, and picked up the girls. On the way over to their house it started raining quite a lot (side note: Chloe is VERY AFRAID of thunder/lightening) so we decided to divide and conquer so I hung out with the girls at their house and Andrew when home and took care of Chloe. Once again, same sleeping arrangements.

On Sunday (Andrew's Birthday), I got the girls up, fed, dressed and ready for church and thought of what I thought was a GENIUS plan (note this is where all my mistakes happen). I knew I needed to make a cake so I had Andrew pick the girls and I up and take us to our house where I would make his birthday cake and he and the girls could watch Fantasia before church (they wanted to watch it, we had it, I could bake Andrew's cake= PERFECT!) 

Cute 4-year-old on our way to our house before church

The cute 2-year-old making a funny face!

We got to our house I started baking my first vanilla cake from scratch using a recipe I found on a AWESOME app (AllRecipes, GET IT). Little did I know this cake was a bit above my skill level (and by bit I mean a lot). You had to make a meringue (I didn't even know what that was), I started will all the usual components first and then tackled the meringue. I had been blending for 10 mins with my beautiful 9-speed hand mixer (during the blending I did stop to take a break to tell Andrew how much I loved it- it was a Christmas present from him). Nothing was happening with the egg whites. So I turned to trusty youtube and found that they should have made this crazy frothy texture and like a long time ago. MISTAKE 1. I somehow messed up making meringue. It had taken me eight eggs to get four in the bowl that didn't include yolk so needless to say we were out of eggs and I couldn't try again. In the process of messing up the meringue I had set the sugar container on the burner and it MELTED, mind you the burner wasn't on but it was on the burner that had the oven vent MISTAKE TWO. I picked up the container from off the stove and about 2.5 lbs of sugar came GUSHING out the bottom. I quickly maneuvered it to the sink where the remaining 2.5 lbs of sugar spilled into the sink (not on the disposal side, mind you). Each time Andrew jumped up to help me and with our two minds we decided to brilliantly just wash the sugar down the drain. Well, we clogged the drain (4th grade science "saturated solution" ring bells for anyone?)

By this time Andrew took the girls over to another friends house and they took the girls to church. While he was gone I was determined to fix the sink. I decided if I ran the disposal maybe that would help (since both pipes are connected...that was my reasoning) well I made sure the water was running down the disposal side and ran the disposal, it seemed to be helping a little bit but the the disposal pooped out MISTAKE 3, I broke our disposal. When I told Andrew what I did, he laughed, when I told him it was probably running for 5 mins, his eyebrows rose and he gave me a "5 MINUTES?!!?" I then told him okay, maybe 3.5 to 4 minutes, I really don't know how long it ran but it broke :(. Not deterred by breaking that, I decided that I was going to exercise my plumber skills (as learned by Mario and Luigi, I really have no other experience) and loosen the pipes to get the sugar out. I thought ahead this time and put the largest pot underneath when I was planning on taking off the pipe to catch the falling sugar/water. I loosened the pipe ever so slightly AND IT WORKED instantly it was as if I opened a closed drain and it fell down freely! Confident that I had fixed the sink I prepared for Andrew to come home and celebrate his birthday (see pics below)

(My family's tradition to take a picture with all the opened and unopened presents, I forgot the unopened picture MISTAKE 4)

 (We put all of the bows on Chloe, as you can see, she LOVED IT, HA!)

 (Chloe at her favor place- the big bed- with the bows= not her favorite)

He opened presents, I went and taught Sunday School at church, and then we ran to Pensacola to have the birthday date that was planned for Saturday night (ironic that my lesson at church was supposed to be on Hypocrisy, ugh story of my life!) We went and saw Super 8, Andrew's pick, I thought it was a well done movie, totally worth a watch and the price of a Sunday matinee! After the movie we ate dinner at our FAVORITE PLACE MELLOW MUSHROOM! We got our usual order's and I covertly told the server it was Andrew's birthday. After we were fully stuffed with our pizza he brought out this HUGE cookie/ice cream creation! Andrew took one for the team and ate all the ice cream and I helped him eat a little of the cookie. Then we went to Target and I got him candles and a birthday card MISTAKES 5 & 6. 

We then went home, realized that I didn't have enough time to try and make the cake (we bought eggs and an egg separator- so sue us!) So I went and picked up the girls while Andrew stayed with Chloe since we had been gone for a while (we just felt so bad leaving her so much this weekend, it didn't seem nice/fair). I put the girls to bed and dropped them off at another friend's house this morning. I thought all my mistakes would have been over, NOT.

Determined to make Andrew a birthday cake (albeit a day late) I tried the meringue again while I warmed up the oven. IT WORKED!!! Maybe it was youtube, the separator, or a combination of the two but I felt successful that it worked! While I was whipping the meringue there was a bit of smoke coming out of the oven vent in the burner element, I thought, oh a little sugar must have fallen down there. Chloe is SCARED TO DEATH when our OVERLY SENSITIVE smoke detector goes off so I start fanning the smoke with a kitchen cloth while whipping my meringue (all the while I am thinking, "I am so cool look at all this multi-tasking!") The smoke grew larger and larger and as I looked in the oven I noticed that it was quite a lot of sugar that fell in the oven via the vent. I turned the oven off and let it cool down. When I opened it up there was a HUGE PILE of melted sugar on the bottom of the oven MISTAKE 7 burned sugar to the bottom of my oven. As I looked at it I knew there was NO WAY that Andrew's cake would be baked that day. Then I had the brilliant idea to scrape it off with a sponge= didn't work. I didn't want to use my good cutlery to try to dislodge the sugar so I tried to look for any of our odds and ends for our college days, had I given it all away? OF COURSE I HAD! Then I started to get desperate so I took one of my Pottery Barn knives and started scraping, it did just the trick and it didn't ruin my knife! Just that experience makes me want to do more business with that company!

During that experience I realized that yesterday I put the beaters on my hand mixer incorrectly and that is a BAD THING! They were stuck on! MISTAKE 8. I could have waited for Andrew to come home and use his man muscles  to dislodge my poor beaters, but I felt too bad for my very much loved mixer. So I got all Miss Miller on it (do yourself a favor and watch The Chipmunk Adventure, you'll know what I'm talking about). I cleaned up that mess and gave my mixer a hug and possibly a get-better-kiss (it still works, mind you) and put the cakes in the oven. 

In other news, both of the girls ABSOLUTELY LOVED ANDREW, they told him many times that he was their "favorite". Through this experience I have decided that when we have children (and this is NOT an announcement, we are still thinking a few years down the road) that Andrew will be the favorite for just being himself and I will possibly burn our house down or do any of my aforementioned mistakes, but times a million! In other words, when we have kids PRAY FOR US! 

Just Like HEAVEN!

Catching up....

I was lucky to be able to visit Andrew over President's Day weekend. IT WAS WONDERFUL! I went to the airport after my class and flew through the night, it was worth it! 

Andrew was there to pick me up around 8:30 am in Pensacola. Luckily Andrew and a friend picked up our new bed the night before and Andrew put it all together so the first thing we did when I got there was take a much needed nap! 

Andrew displaying his putting-together manly skills! Once we finally move all our stuff to Florida next month this will move to the guest room (for those of you who come to visit-- it is VERY COMFY!) 

Once we finally got ready for the day we went and re-signed our lease until September 2012. We really like where we live and they gave us a killer deal! 

After all the business was taken care of we went to Pensacola to MY FAVORITE RESTAURANT- Mellow Mushroom for a late Valentines Dinner. We both ordered our favs (Andrew: Pineapple and Pepperoni, Meghan: Tempeh, Broccoli, and Onions with Vegan Cheese) and went to a hockey game! 

The hockey game  was really fun (as always) we saw a few fights and the between period activity was "Wiener dog races!"

It was pretty funny and cute! After the race was over the dogs and their owners just hung out on the ice for a while and played. You could tell the dogs were having a BLAST!

Sunday was church and relaxing. Andrew had meetings before and after church but I just waited on him. We had our leftover pizza (YUM!) and fed the ducks at the duck pond behind our building. It wasn't as much fun without out little cute Chloe barking her head off at them! 

Monday we went to the beach....it was BEAUTIFUL! It was nice to have to put on sunscreen in February. February, people! We just soaked up the sun and I read a book...FOR FUN....it was SO GREAT to read a book that had nothing to do with school, class, or my thesis. Granted, I read a book about personal finance, but still. It's what I'm into nowadays. We both are VERY excited for the summer when we can go to the beach after work and just relax (I mean, how couldn't you...)

Sadly, Andrew had to take me back to the airport Monday night but not before we ate at Panera (another of our favorites!) 

It felt heavenly to be with my husband it made us realize that while we know the time apart is the best for a careers, being together is SO MUCH BETTER than being apart! April 16th can't come soon enough! 

OH and PS this is what I came back to, ugh. 

-M

My Valentine!

Well we had our first Valentines day as a married couple, unfortunately we were in different states, but we still celebrated it nonetheless! Andrew got me this AWESOME edible arrangement.....

It was soo yummy! I had wanted one for a while but told Andrew it was too expensive to justify. I said when I had a baby (which will not happen a few years, people) he could get me one then-- because then I would deserve one. When I saw it I thought "and I didn't even have to have a baby to get one! HA!". For Valentines Day I got Andrew chicken and hamburgers from his FAVORITE meat supplier-- Omaha Steaks. In my Mom's words...we sure do know the way to each others hearts! 

We had a lovely evening of FaceTiming and talked about how happy we will be to see one another in FIVE DAYS!!! I fly out of SLC on Friday but because of the flights and time change I won't get into Pensacola until the following morning! Oh well, it will be well worth it! 

As for family updates...hmm. Well I have turned in my prospectus to my Thesis chair. Basically I have started the ball rolling on this whole long process. Hopefully it will go by quicker than I expect (meaning I can graduate SOON!) My class is going well and I am really enjoying teaching, just trying to find a job for after teaching...we'll see how that goes.....

Andrew is doing well in his job. He really likes it and it sure does keep him busy! Sadly he will be going to California for work the week that we were planning on moving all our stuff out to Florida. I told him no worries, my friend Fel will help me do the drive! 

So we are planning on driving the Penske out ourselves and towing my car behind us. Mine and Andrew's parents aren't too excited about it, but hey... would you want to mess with my friend Fel? I think not....

It will be a fun trip for the two of us. We are going to drive it in three days, just in time to be home before Andrew has to leave for California! 

Andrew will be going on another business trip to DC this summer. Hopefully I can join him this time and take him to some of the monuments. If not, it sounds like this will be a yearly adventure so someday it will happen! 

I will be so glad when February is over as that means Andrew and I will only have 1.5 months left to be apart! It will be so great to be with him again! I miss him very, very much! 

I hope you all had a WONDERFUL Valentines Day and that you were able to spend it with those you love, if not, I feel your pain friends! Hopefully next year will be better for you! 

-M

Weekend Wonderfulness!

Last weekend was WONDERFUL! Why, you ask? Because ANDREW was in town! He flew out for a much-needed visit and we had a great time!

He left right after work on Friday and got into Utah around 11:40. His flight was early, something I was happy about! We got his bag and made our way to Springville were I got us a cheap hotel via. Priceline.

We slept on saturday (well until 745), ate a great continental breakfast and drove up to Provo so that we could get our snow gear at Andrew's parents house and also so that Andrew could wax our boards! Then it was up to PARK CITY!! We knew it was going to be a busy weekend as Sundance was still there. (Question, why is it called Sundance when it is held in Park City? Was it originally in Sundance or something....just wondering) Anyway, Park City's parking was non-existant so we made our way over to the Canyons via a stop at Taco Bell before I "hulked". (Side note: I get GRUMPY when I'm hungry. Andrew says I turn into the incredible hulk...hence, hulking.) Since I was fed and happy, no "hulking" happened...but you can never be too careful...


After food we finally got to the Canyons paid the ridiculous half-day price (which INCLUDED  a military discount and I still think it was OUTRAGEOUS!) And made our way up the slopes! We started on the bunny hill as I was nervous how I would do being off a board for over a year. With that single trip I felt confident enough to move up to the blue squares. Andrew knew just the place to go on the mountain and we were off. After about 3 1/2 hours of some quality snowboarding we were both pooped! We we up one more time and snowboarded the whole way down....for those of you who've been to The Canyons...thats a LONG FREAKING WAY! It was strange to go for such a short time, I attribute it to our getting older...Andrew attributes it to the drastic change in elevation (but then what's my excuse?!)

A perk of being at the Canyons....heated lifts!!! We felt so fancy being in the orange "bubble lifts" as I called them....

After snowboarding we bummed around the outlets for a little bit and then went to meet Andrew's best friend Clark at Bajio in Salt Lake. It was fun hanging out with them but when we got back to Springville that night we were sure pooped! We watched the latest 30 Rock episode on hulu (during which I promptly fell asleep!)

Sunday we slept in, (no church= guilty!). Got breakfast and hang out with our mutual best friend (my current roomie and landlord, Cindy). Andrew was upset that he couldn't beat her at Mario Kart! HA! He's out of practice! We then went and hung out with his parents for a while and had a late Christmas with them. Sunday night was just us and it was GLORIOUS! It was good to have time to ourselves just being a couple again. I think we both had been used to being alone that being together was so great! As cheesy as it sounds, he really is my best friend (yes, it does make me want to hurp just reading that I typed that...not because it's a bad thing, just because it's cheesy)

Monday wasn't as fun as we knew that we would have to part soon. We lived up what moments we did have and took Andrew to the dentist (romantic, I know). The dentist here is one we respect (plus our friend Cindy works there), as opposed to the one in Florida that was trying to rob us blind! We then just got our last-minute cuddling in and were off to the airport. That was the WORST part. But the good news is that I'll be in Florida in TWELVE DAYS! HOORAY! It will be another FABULOUS WEEKEND!  

Ugh...

My brain hurts too much to give this blog post a catchy title, so you get what's going on in my mind...ugh!

What have the Wight's been up to you ask? Quite a lot! I'm not at my home computer so sadly you get no pictures but at least I can tell you what we've been doing....

- We went to my parent's in NC for Christmas. We had a really good time. Quite possibly the coolest thing was that my whole family went to the "Beast of the Southeast" a.k.a. Lowe's Motor Speedway to see the Christmas lights that they had up on and around the track. It was really fun to be able to walk through the pit-crew areas where the cars are parked before the events. The most fun was that WE DROVE ON A NASCAR TRACK! At the very end of the lights (during which you drive on the road in the middle of the track where RV's are usually parked during a race), each car was able to drive about 1/4th of the track! Let me tell you, car's were peeling out (is that how you spell the expression)? My dad had the privilege of driving all six of us (plus cute little Chloe- our dog) in our 1995-ish conversion van. It was SO MUCH FUN! I convinced my dad to "punch it" as soon as he got on the track and "punch it" he did! All of us (except for dad) had our hands over our heads like when one is on a roller coaster as the road was banked so steeply it felt like we were going to fall over. He was able to get the car up to 65 mph before we had to leave the track. SUPER FUN. Now I know why Ricky Bobby wants to "go fast", I sure did too!

So I know I said no pictures, but I found some on the internet of what our van looks like (kinda) and the track so you can see how awesome it was that we drove that crazy van on the track!

- The rest of our short, short trip to NC was great. We just basically hung out, watched movies, and played games (my favorite). Andrew and I made sure to take our little Chloe on a walk every day to keep us fit in trim. She has found a new love of running which sure wore Andrew and I out. Sadly, we had to leave her in NC as we didn't feel it fair that she had to be home alone all day while Andrew was at work and I wasn't there, but we will get her back in May!

- Andrew and I enjoyed our last week together by watching lots of 30 Rock (I got him all the seasons for Christmas) and playing games.

- Sadly, I had to leave to go back to Utah on January 3rd to teach a class at BYU. That's been hard. THANK GOODNESS for FaceTime via our phones! It makes the separation not seem as horrible!

- Luckily Andrew will be in town this weekend!!!! Hooray! So we will have 2 1/2 glorious days of being together before he has to go back to Florida (I'm jealous) and back to work :(. We are planning on snowboarding, hanging out with friends and family, and spending every second with each other!

- Andrew went to DC for a business trip last week. He learned a lot and was able to hang out with some of my family! He also stopped by the Academy for fun.

- I am REALLY ENJOYING teaching here at BYU. I only wish there were a position I could work at in Florida after this is all over. There doesn't seem to be one. Hence, my frustration and therefore this blog post which has really helped me de-stress (thanks blogger!). I am currently amp'ing up my resume and getting ready to apply for some jobs in the area, so keep your fingers crossed!

I hope all of you readers are happy and healthy!
- M.