Happy Valentine's Day!

I've never been a huge fan of Valentine's Day.  I have always thought it was kind of cheesy.  I usually prefer to do normal sorts of things on that day.  Last year I did two of my favorite things with two of my favorite people:  I ate at Chick-Fil-A and went to the movies with Curt and Laura.  It was glorious.  I would do it again every year.  Except this year we would've gone to see Justin Beiber:  Never Say Never.  In 3D.

Now that I'm married, I decided to give the more traditional celebrations a try....  Surprisingly, it was a lot of fun.  Since we're poor and can't afford to go out to eat, we decided to pretend like we were at a restaurant in our own apartment.  We set the table up nicely, planned out an appetizer, main dish, dessert, and special drinks.  If your wallet is a little on the light side, and you LOVE to go out to eat, I highly recommend trying this.

Our appetizer:  spinach and artichoke dip with fresh parmesan cheese and blue tortilla chips (best chips in the world, in my humble opinion)

It ain't Valentine's Day without some heart socks!

Main dish: Lobster (our new fave) with garlic butter sauce and roasted asparagus.  This time we cooked the lobster ourselves....sooo good.

My cute chef hard at work.

Yum!

Yes, we had homemade creme brulee again.  It's that good.  And yes, we basically just re-created our Christmas Eve dinner....why mess with a good thing?

This gorgeous card came from my lovely friend, Mallory.  I thought it perfectly embodied the spirit of Valentine's Day.  Thanks again, friend!

The best part of the night:  I got to relax on the couch while Curt did ALL the dishes.  Amazing!


This day made me thankful for the abundance of love in my own life from my husband, my family, and my friends.  But more importantly, from my Heavenly Father.  I'm thankful for a love that never changes, always satisfies, and teaches our own fickle hearts how to love. 

"We love because he first loved us."

1 John 4:19

Superbowl!

Last week we hosted our first party for Superbowl XLV.  Somehow we fit 7 or 8 couples WITH children into our little apartment, and actually had a great time.  Our Austrian friends Ewald and Constanze had never seen American football, so we did our best to explain the game and some of the American traditions that go along with it.  Constanze was especially surprised when the Packers dumped Gatorade on their coach after the game.  

 

Little Taylor Gronewoller was into the game.  

Connor Marsh with his gameface on.

 

This little guy is pretty sweet. 

 

I'm hilarious.

The Bourckels....love our neighbors!

The kids watched a moved in the bedroom.

Thanks B Building people (and the Marshes) for watching the game (or really the commercials) with us!

aNOTHER snow day!

Soooo I'm new to this area....but I'm pretty sure TWO snow days from work are almost unheard of up here (correct me if I'm wrong, New England-ers).  But I'm not complaining!  Gordon-Conwell was closed too, so Curt and I had the day off together.  It was really great to slow down for a day, spend some extra time reading the Bible, and drink my coffee out of a real cup instead of a travel mug.   I didn't chronicle my whole day this time....I didn't think y'all really cared about seeing pictures of me laying on the couch.  Needless to say, it was a pretty lazy day.

However, I did want to keep with the tradition of making cinnamon buns on a snow day, but didn't have any on-hand from the grocery store.  I decided to try to make them from scratch.   I didn't quite realize what an undertaking this was because I started them at around 7am and we didn't actually end up eating them until about 11:30am.  Whoops!  I guess if you really wanted them for breakfast, you'd have to wake up verryyyy early.  Just in case you're curious, I used this recipe.

Also, this was very exciting because I got to use my new Kitchen-Aid stand mixer for the 2nd time!  Thanks again to the Barritt clan for this amazing gift.  I love it!

 

They turned out pretty well!  Come visit us and I'll make these for you.  Yes, I am willing to bribe visitors with food.  I promise, it's not that cold up here... bahahaha!

And yes, Laura and I will have these on the menu at "Crumbs"  (see the end of this post if you're confused).