Jon's Banana-Bread Chocolate Pie

 I came home from church yesterday to find my cute hubby cooking away in the kitchen. He was stirring an unidentifiable, goobery mass on the stove which he promptly had me taste. He called it "mooshed banana pie". He mushed up 3 ultra-ripe bananas, a handful of chopped pecans, a handful of sweetened-shredded coconut, 1 can of evaporated milk, and some sugar and honey to taste. It was TO DIE FOR! He poured the banana-moosh into the base of a graham shell and then put chocolate pudding on the top covered with more coconut and pecans. Delish!!! Isn't it beautiful?

Jon devouring his masterpiece while we watched "Archangel" Sunday afternoon. I'm so proud of my sweetie!

Beautiful Monterey

Here are a few pictures of our beautiful Monterey...These have been a long time coming! :) Most of these are at Pebble Beach, the others are of Cannery Row.

If you look closely at the picture above, you can see a huge starfish just up from the bottom-center of the photo...he's a white one!

The pics below are of Cannery Row...So much fun!(and so many yummy places to eat!)

Isn't it beautiful!!!!??

The Tanners Came to Town!

It finally happened!!! Our good, good friends the Tanners just came to visit us last week!!! Jon and Logan Tanner grew up together and are best buds. Kristen Tanner and I have grown close as well as the years have gone by. They are both soooo awesome! The also have the cutest around; baby Olin Tanner. We had so much fun exploring around Monterey while they were here. We got to do the wharf, shop up around San Jose, walk around Carmel by the Sea Beach, and do the 17 mile drive! Sadly(but bittersweet) they had to leave a few days early. However, it was because LOGAN GOT A JOB!!!! wooohooo!! We're so excited for him! He'll be working at an advertising agency in SLC as their copyright assistant(I think that's what it's called). He'll be sooo awesome! We'll be visiting THEM next since they'll be getting a house or apartment downtown after 1 year of having everything in storage and living off the bare minimum(I KNOW Kristen is psyched for this particular aspect!) We miss them already and can't wait to see them at Christmas time!

Here's their cute, cute family. Practically part of our family too! :)

Here's Kristen and I at the Wharf in Monterey....Mmmmm, we ate some awesome chowder that day!

Here's Logan and Olin at the Wharf...Isn't that backpack perfect for Olin?? Most ingenious invention for babies ever.

Here's cute baby Olin and Kristen(best mom in the world)....Can you believe we found a street in San Jose name "Olin Avenue"???!! Craziness! (Isn't he the cutest little man ever??!)

Here's Kristen, Olin and I at Carmel by the Sea Beach...Just as the sun was setting. Gorgeous!

Check out this mansion just off of the beach here too! It was AMAAAAZING!

Olin and Logie....best daddy ever!

We just found out that my family will be coming out in the middle of October again and I'm already planning all the fun things we're going to do with them when they come. Ciao!

Beautification comes slowly

We got our furniture!!! Just in time to decorate for fall, I might add as well. It finally feels like someone actually lives here! Fall is and always has been one of my absolute favorite seasons, which gives me a fantastic excuse to decorate to my little heart's content! Hahaha, what do you think? It's so cozy and nice to be here now. All we need to improve upon it, would be to have fall leaves blowing down the street....not gonna happen though. Gotta love Cali! :)

One side of the living room...

...The other side of the Living Room

Front entryway

 TV...This was the hardest thing to figure out a spot for. This house has the goofiest layout EVER!

Dining Room looking towards the kitchen and patio...

 Across from the Dining Room table.

Kitchen...

 Sitting room by the kitchen

 KITCHEN!

My precious bookcase room; there are 3 more cases in here!(mostly filled with my cookbooks...hehe)

We're still working on "spiffing up" the top floor....pics to follow soon I hope!

Mystery Dinner Party

For anyone who's been in YW, you should know what a Mystery Dinner is. We're not talking a murder mystery dinner, but something entirely different and soooo much fun!!! You take a basic menu and rename everything(utensils included!!) and then place this funny-named menu before the people eating. From there they choose what they'll be served by 4 different courses of 4 items. See below for an example of the one I put together:It was so much fun! We gave them their plates and cups as a freebie, but everything else had to be ordered! hahah! A couple of the girls ended up with a pile of ice cream sprinkles and a fork, napkin, and spoon! hahah! awesome.... try this if you're ever in the mood to mix up your dinner during the week!

MYSTERY DINNER
1	The Dish's running partner	9	Bessie's "chew"
2	Grandma's muscles	10	The other reindeer
3	Slumbering cousins	11	Health freak
4	America's 1st dimpled sweetheart	12	Offensive wonder
5	Wormy tomatoes	13	Grease lightening
6	Farmer's friend	14	Italian snow
7	Jack's demise	15	"Udderly" sinful
8	Asian tweezers	16	Opposite of pour
ANSWERS:
1	Spoon	9	Straw
2	Jell-O salad	10	Olive
3	Napkin	11	Salad
4	Shirley Temples	12	Garlic bread
5	Spaghetti	13	Butter knife
6	Fork	14	Parmesan cheese
7	Green beans	15	Ice cream
8	Chopsticks	16	Ice cream sprinkles

Try it out!!!    

UTAH!!!!!

Who doesn't love a fabulous vacation!? Well, we finally got to have one ourselves! Jon's class break was the last week of August and we took the opportunity to go home to UT and see our families...both of us this time!(I travel back for work every couple of months)

We stayed at mom and dad Raymond's house and got to have fun seeing them everyday. Sunday night, mom planned a fun picnic up Provo Canyon at Canyon Glen Park. We had fried chicken and hung out by the river with Jenn, Jackie, and Justin and of course all the little kids! Can you believe Sayla(our 3 yr old niece) is riding a 2 wheeler!! crazy!!! That girl's gonna rule the world by the time she's 10! haha!

Here's Jackie and Jeremy and Taiben and Sayla....What a feast, huh?

Here's us with Justin. He's been digging a Rock-Climbing cave out of the mountain behind us. He's basically the superman of outdoors activities. Seriously. There was also a weird goth-concert-thing happening over behind that building to the side of Jon. It wasn't bad music actually. Those people were crazy talented!!

Of course mom needed to get a portrait pic of Jonny and I. I have to admit that we make a pretty cute couple! Love that airman!!!

After Sunday, things were pretty much just chill and go-with-the-flow days. My mom and family had a yummy dinner for us on Monday night. We had fun talking and hanging out with the kids and mom and dad. They even invited their friend Leland to come too! It makes me homesick just talking about it.

Overall, Utah was great. We can't wait to go back in December!!!