Happy Anniversary - Here's a New Bathroom!

It's AUGUST 29th!!  You know what that means?  We're not newlyweds anymore.  And the end of summer is nearing.  And the weather is getting a bit crisper.  The Mr. and I celebrated our 1st anniversary yesterday with a nice, relaxing evening at home.  I made dinner, he made cookies.  I bought him some clothes from Eddie Bauer (great clearance rack!) and he bought me some roses.  I had a fantasy football draft and he helped with my picks.  I guess we technically celebrated a few weeks ago when we went to the Book of Mormon (fantastic!) and had a nice sushi dinner:

Which reminds me... I think I'm going to try on my wedding dress tonight...

I have great expectations for this blog once summer has officially passed.  I'm planning a redesign in my head and have lots of blog posts lined up.  In the meantime, I've been meaning to show you our new bathroom for quite some time so here you go!

Before:

Not great pictures but you get the point: it was a small, outdated bathroom.

During:

 We tore up everything.

We inspected.

We tiled (thanks FIL!).

We painted.

We supervised.

After:

Renovations are so rewarding!

Rocky Mountain High

We finally had a full day free on a beautiful weekend in Colorado so we headed to the mountains with a few friends to hike the highest mountain in the state.  Mt. Elbert, at 14,433 feet, was no easy task.  We were (slightly) out of shape for this little adventure but it was fun nonetheless.  It took about seven hours round-trip, was the first 14er for two of the five in the group, and the first 14er where an app was successfully downloaded and utilized during the hike.  We kept track of our elevation gain - mostly for encouragement purposes - and sang along to Call Me Maybe on the way down. It was a fun, long day!!

 

HAPPY (belated) BIRTHDAY, HUBBY!

The Mr. celebrated his 28th birthday earlier this month (which sounds like a totally reasonable excuse as to why I haven't blogged in so long).  We celebrated by taking a trip to MeXicO!  Well, not really... but kinda.  One of the Mr.'s high school buddies was getting married and it just so happened to coincide with the big birthday.  So what do I, the best wife ever, do for the hubby on his birthday in Mexico?

I made him miserable.  We went on a little excursion to the Mayan ruins of Tulum and then we went snorkeling in the most wonderful lagoon in Akumel, outside of Playa del Carmen.  It was wonderful.  For me.  Did I mention that the Mr. doesn't know how to swim and is petrified of putting his face under water?  The icing on the cake, so to speak, is that it was election day in Mexico.  That means that you can't buy alcohol anywhere on that one specific day -- his birthday.  Best birthday ever!!

In all seriousness, we had a good trip.  A week was a bit long for us to stay in one place but we had some quality time together with each other, his friends, and MY PARENTS who decided to crash the party at the last responsible moment.

Aren't they cute?!

More pics:

The view from our hotel room.

Hammocks.

Happy wedding guests (please ignore our wind-swept hair).

My favorite picture!  Who has bigger muscles?!

La playa.

This trip concludes wedding season 2012 and our travels for the year (we think).  Which leaves me more time to blog, obviously.

Until next time!

Don't Threaten Me

My dearest MOB tried to threaten me yesterday (or was it this morning?) by accusing me of being "bored with (my) blog."  How dare she?!  So, consider this post dedicated to the best MOB in the world!

I.  Love.  Summer.  Like, seriously.  I initially wanted to post pictures of our new, beautiful bathroom but, since it's been nearly four weeks since my last post, here's a glimpse of the beginning of our summer...

My dear Auntie Claire gifted us with one of her incredible paintings.  We promptly hung it in a prominent place in our living room after it inspired a complete re-org (and new furniture!).

Another one of Auntie Claire's masterpieces, proudly hung in the kitchen.

 We attended Ashley's 30th Birthday Bash and reunited with former coworkers (I love this photo.  We obviously have fun together!).

 We grew our hair out...

 We attended a wedding in Waukesha, WI.

 We went to Miller Park...

 ...and tailgated before...

 ...the baseball game.

And then we watched the sausage races!

Since then, we've worked on landscaping our yard (no pictures... yet), going to brunch with friends and enjoying the warm weather.

For good measure, he's a glimpse at our Punta Cana trip:

 Did I mention that the Mister won the dart competition?  Don't worry, he didn't really try to kill me...

I know it's blurry, but I love this picture... we're in looooove.

Da Dogs

We were dog-sitting for the past ten days while our friends took an international trip.  Moose, their corgie-mix, has been to our house numerous times with the same mixed results: while he's a great dog, he doesn't exactly jump at the chance to play with our spoiled puggle.

For example: the Mister and I sit on the couch and watch TV after work.  Pugsley, the puggle, likes to sit next to/on top of/ascloseaspossible to us at all times.  Recently he's taken a liking to our new living room chairs.

Hi, Mr. Pugsley!

At some point during the evening, we start wondering what happened to Moose, the corgie-mix.  We have photographic evidence of what we saw next:

He just lays there... on his back... not making a sound...
This became a normal sight.

Sigh.

Recipe: Legit Nutella Cheesecake

We are long overdue for a good recipe but I promise this one won't disappoint!  A co-worker passed along the recipe after I heard him going on and on and on and on about his wife's cheesecake.  Admittedly, I'm not a huge cheesecake fan but I am fascinated by the Nutella obsession.  My MIL requested chocolate cheesecake for the Mother's Day dinner so I found this to be the perfect opportunity to try-out a new recipe.  It didn't disappoint.

Note: I made a Gluten Free version by using GF oreos for the crust and GF flour.  

Ingredients:

• Crust
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate cookie crumbs
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup melted butter
• Filling
• 24 ounces cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 whole egg
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 (13 ounce) jar nutella
• 
  

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
• In a small mixing bowl, combine crust ingredients. Pat into the bottom of springform pan and bake for 10 minutes.
• In the bowl of a mixer, beat cream cheese, sugar, flour and vanilla extract until just combined. Add egg yolks and egg, beat on low until just combined. Add milk and Nutella and mix completely.
• Pour filling into springform pan. Reduce oven temperature to 300 degrees F. Place springform pan on a deep cookie sheet and then place in oven. Create a water bath by adding water to the outer cookie sheet, just enough to fill the pan halfway up the side of the springform pan. This will help buffer the heat from the bottom of the oven.
• Bake for 1 1/2 hours, or until center appears set when shaken lightly. Remove from water bath and cool on a wire rack. Remove cake from pan, cool, and store in the refrigerator.

ENJOY!

First Dance Awesomeness

...and we're back! The hubster and I just returned from an amazing vacation in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. We went with his company who sponsored the trip after the team hit their sales goal for 2011. The weather was perfect, the water was gorgeous and the food and drink were plentiful. Only problem: I forgot my camera. Seriously. Who does that?! I'm gathering photos from our fellow travelers and will post a few soon. In the meantime, I highly suggest you plan a little beach vacay to PC, DR. It won't disappoint. We went to our first wedding of the season a few weeks ago here in Denver and they did something amazing with their first dance that I've never seen before. Their DJ, a radio guy, pulled them both into his studio several weeks before the wedding and interviewed them separately. They spoke about how they met, their favorite memories, their engagement and their wishes for the future. He then inserted their comments into their chosen first dance song during the instrumental periods. The couple didn't hear the finished product before the wedding so it was all a surprise. I don't think there was a dry eye in the house after that one! Take note, Brides! That's all for now... Coming up: bathroom renovations pictures (finally!), landscaping update and new living room furniture!