Chili Verde

I had a bunch of tomatillos and peppers from the garden I wanted to use. After searching online I found this recipe from Food Network.com for pork chili verde that I wanted to try.

I knew it was going to make a ton so we invited some friends over for dinner. I was kind of nervous because I had never made it before and had no idea how spicy it would be. The recipe calls for a lot of peppers and I kept envisioning our friends eating it as a courtesy while secretly dying of fire! ;)

I am not going to lie, this was not a quick and easy meal to make, but I am SO glad I did. It was delicious! And good thing too, because if it hadn't turned out I wouldn't have been very happy at the big stack of dirty dishes I accumulated while making it.

We used the chili verde in burritos with sour cream, cheese, guacamole, etc. It was SO good. The pork was way tender and the sauce was so yummy and surprisingly mild (I took out most of the ribs and seeds of the peppers). We still had some left so I froze the rest and can't wait to eat it again on a night when we need a quick dinner.

If you have the time and the energy, I HIGHLY recommend this recipe. I think it is worth the work!

P.S. I served it with this rice from my friend Rachelle's awesome cooking blog. It is the easiest rice in the world to make and a favorite in our house. Thanks for the recipe Rachelle :)

Third Year

Sean started his third (and final) year of law school yesterday! I made him let me take a picture because I am just so darn proud of him. :)

It's strange thinking this is his last year. When we got married I still had more than a year of school left myself and I remembered thinking seven more years for Sean seemed so far away! Time flies.

Congrats on being an official 3L and one of the "big dawgs" on campus! ;)

Water fun

We've had a lot of fun in the water lately. Last weekend we got to go boating at Deer Creek with our friends Sam and Kristol and had a great time. It was so relaxing cruising around in the boat and enjoying the nice weather.

A few days ago we hit up the Lindon City Pool as a family. We love that place! Jackson was in heaven. Here are a few videos:

Sean trying out the Flow Rider:

Zero fear of the water:

Lazy river:

Finally, Sean went boating with his co-workers last week and he got to try wake surfing. He LOVED it and can't stop talking about how much fun it is.

A bit of humor

I saw this sign yesterday and it gave me a good laugh :)

Cabin trip: Ricks, Ogden & Pickups!

My parents were nice enough to loan us their cabin for the majority of last week so we could vacation with friends. We went with our friends Sam and Kristol and Brian and Samantha. Oh, and these handsome guys came along too:

Daxton, Jackson and Simon. What a good-looking bunch! Ages: 13 months, 19 months, and 27 months. The three of them were a crack up and kept us entertained!

We spent a lot of time in Yellowstone and luckily we had great weather.

Yellowstone Falls

Old Faithful

Swimming at Firehole

That's Sean jumping in. We were all brave and jumped in the rapids. It was SO much fun! I can't wait to go back.

Pretty much the entire time Jackson was out of the water he was throwing rocks-- his favorite past time as of late.

We really should title our trip the "wildlife tour" because we saw almost every major animal. These include:

Buffalo/Bison

Elk

Grizzly bear!!!

It was super cool to see a grizzly in the wild. We saw it in the park walking along a hill near the Firehole River. I saw a black bear with my brother when I was a kid, but this was my first grizzly sighting.

We also saw wolves, a fox, a bald eagle, and deer. We kept joking that we really needed to see a moose to make our trip complete.

Big Springs: dangling feet after feeding the fish

We also enjoyed our fair share of games at the cabin. My dad just got a new pinball machine called "Big Buck Hunter" and it was a hit. I don't even love pinball, but that thing is addicting. Props to Brian for getting the new high score of 23 million! There were also some intense games of ping pong, pool, foosball, and darts.

I am not kidding when I say the guys were literally sweating during foosball.

The guys also went fishing a few times. Good thing they had awesome scenery because the fishing was not so successful...

On our last day we four wheeled up to the top of Mount Sawtelle. Guess what we saw on the way up-- Moose!!! It was a mother with two little calves. So cool. Our "wildlife tour" was complete!

Loved the view from the top.

The wildflowers were amazing so I made everyone stop on our way back down for a picture. I'm glad I did because I love this one.

We made some good memories had such a great time with everyone. Until next time!

Girls camp recap

I survived! It was a crazy week but a lot of fun. The last night of camp some of the girls told me they didn't want to go home, so I will count that as a success!

The stake ended up being in charge of a lot of activities this year and we did some fun things. We got to tie dye, decorate hats with homemade buttons, canoe on Tibble Fork, go hiking, etc. We had some great firesides too... my particular favorite was the one given by sister Liz Lemon Swindle (30Rock fans--how awesome is it that her name is Liz Lemon?) She is an artist who paints Christ in many of her pieces. Here is her Web site if you are interested.

My favorite part of camp was the bishopric night on Thursday. Our bishopric went all out. Our camp theme was "Daughter of a King" and they (and their wives) planned a royal feast for us for dinner. We were in the middle of the woods eating a five-course meal on our bishop's wife's china! They had Martinelli's for us, silver candle sticks, name cards, cloth napkins, etc. Did I mention our bishopric dressed up in tuxes and escorted the young women to the table? Their cute wives (two of which are pregnant) were dressed up too and were even wearing heels.

Here was the menu each of us had on our plates:

If you can't read it it says:

Chilled cucumber soup

Mixed greens with pan-roasted pears, shaved parmesan, and toasted almonds in a light vinegarette

Mango sorbet (to cleanse the palate of course!)

Honey-lime Tri-tip steak or Marinated grilled chicken

Baked potatoes

Homemade Rolls

Vanilla bean cheesecake

All of the food was amazing, but I'll tell you what... I am still dreaming about that cheesecake. I am not joking when I say it is the best cheesecake I have ever eaten. I didn't think it was possible to top Cheesecake Factory's dulce de leche cheesecake, but trust me when I tell you this beats it! There were white chocolate shavings on top and it was made with real vanilla bean. I will stalk the bishop's wife until she gives me the recipe.

Other fun highlights:

-Getting to know the girls in our ward. They are strong girls who face a lot of difficult challenges and I came away from camp really caring about them and wanting the best for them.

-Sitting around the campfire and singing songs with our bishop on the guitar. He sang a really sweet Jack Johnson song about angels for us. We also sang funny songs mostly made up by Megan (one of the YW counselors and honestly one of the funniest people I have ever met).

-Canoeing and watching our bishop splash everyone with his paddle and tip over the canoes with our girls in them. He was ruthless!

-Thursday night testimony meeting

- Our ward skit. We made up a song and had the bishop prance across the stage as a Gazelle with ribbon dancers tied to his head with a tube sock

-Giant s'mores with the famed marshmallows I blogged about awhile back

-Singing camp songs that I hadn't sung in 10 years and had forgotten

-Winning the award for "Prettiest princess camp"

Not so fun highlights:

-We got rained on the first night and our tents ended up not being waterproof (even though they are supposed to be). I literally climbed into a soaking wet sleeping bag and lay on a soaked through pillow. I also had drips of water falling onto my face all night long-- seriously something you'd see in a movie. Obviously there was no sleep that first night and we had to be up by 5:15 a.m. the next morning for a sunrise hike.

-We walked an unreal distance each day-- I am glad for the exercise, but our campsite was the furthest away and it wasn't very convenient when we had to hike to the bathrooms and activities several times a day.

-I worried about bears the entire time. As I said, our camp was farthest away from the rest of the stake and we had candy all over our campsite. No bears, but we did have a raccoon visitor the last night of camp who loved the cheesecake as much as I did!

On another note, I had a lot of fun decorating our campsite:

Castle painted onto a sheet and hung at the entrance to our camp

I gave my right pointer finger for this castle... the tip of my finger is still numb from holding down the spray paint nozzle! Note: Jackson did not attend camp. He was just there helping me set up the night before.

Camp chair "thrones"

Each throne had the girl's name on it

The assistant camp director made these really cute baskets for the girls for secret sister stuff, etc.

I made these medieval flags with the YW values on them

It was a great week and I am grateful I was able to go. I am so thankful my mom was willing to come to Utah and babysit Jackson for the week so I could go without reservations. Jackson behaved and seemed to really enjoy his time with her. I'm not going to lie though, it's good to be home!

The Fourth

We had a great time celebrating the Fourth of July in Idaho Falls and Island Park!

Parade

Waiting for the fireworks

Hiking in Island Park

Highlights:

-Birthday party for our niece Remington. Lots of good food, including the best gf cupcakes I've ever eaten-- in fact one of the best cupcakes I've ever eaten--period!

-Time with family. My nephew Max was so cute on the Fourth watching the parade. He did not stop waving his flag the entire time.

-Breakfast on the Boulevard with my family and old neighbors and ward members. I look forward to the rhubarb syrup every year!

-Model T rides. Jackson joined his cousins Hayley and Max in throwing candy down the parade route before it started.

-The Idaho Falls parade. I've always loved going and it's even more fun going with a son of my own. We scored at the parade this year with tons of candy, ice cream, and tennis balls.

-BBQ with homemade lemon sorbet and chocolate ice cream.

-Fireworks. They are always amazing and we scored great parking this year. Plus, Julie brought glow sticks which is always a good thing. Jackson enjoyed the show and kept saying "wow!" He was pretty tired about halfway through though.

-Island Park: fourwheeler rides, campfire with s'mores, pinball, walks, seeing a buffalo during a quick drive in the park, hiking by coffeepot with my family (even though it turned out to be more like rock climbing!)

Lowlights:

-Colder than normal temperatures. We were freezing at the beginning of the parade. Luckily it warmed up and the afternoon was nice.

-Not enough time! I left wishing I had a few more days to spend at the cabin.

Hope you all had a great Fourth of July. As for me, girls camp is next week so time to get back to reality!