August Happenings

Just so you know before you start...this is an extremely long post containing LOTS of pictures! Ready? Okay, here we go!

A couple weekends ago, Rich and I decided to go to the beach for the afternoon. We went up towards Lincoln City, OR and then drove back down the coast to Newport and then back home. On our way back down the coast we stopped and went to this rocky beach place and we found a bunch of tide pools! We had a good time going around looking at all the different things and then looking at the pretty ocean for a while. We heard that there were whales migrating at that time but we never saw any (bummer!).

A sweet looking woody on our way to the beach

There's a little tadpole in there. This one had it's legs and little of it's arms, but still had it's tail.
Cool drop-off into the ocean
♥ ♥ ♥
Sea urchin thingy
Pretty view of the beach and lot of caves on the other side
Being silly...nothing unusual

Rich seems to take better pictures than I do
Beautiful orange wildflowers along the road...
...Lots of them!
There used to be a wooden bridge here instead
☺

On our way home we decided to make a quick stop at the store in Philomath. We were walking towards the store when we both happened to look over and see this:

We're not quite sure what's going on here...maybe "STOP! In the name of the law!" or ?? It was just so funny I had to grab the camera and take a picture so I could share this with everyone.

Monday night last week, my mom and dad came down for a baseball game here in Corvallis. It's a summer team (Corvallis Knights), but it's mostly made up of the OSU baseball team and some other people that come from nearby. It was the last game of the season for them (sadly, because they lost), but we had a really good time. Tickets were cheap (hot dogs weren't), and we got really good seats. They were about 3 rows up a little past first base. It was a good game there in the 9th inning...they just couldn't quite get there. There's always next year!

Last weekend, Rich and I went up to see his family and go FISHING! I was pretty excited about going fishing and not having to be on a boat in the middle of the ocean for it. We just went down the the Columbia River and started fishing. We didn't really catch much. Robbie caught some small mouth bass and some blue gill but we were all going for the big carp that are going through the river. Carp aren't good fish to eat, but they are fun to catch and release. No one caught one all day...we had some bites but nothing. Not until Rich said, "Come over here and reel it in!" So I ran over and started reeling something in and it turned out to be a carp! They look a lot like coy fish to me but it was fun to see something a little bigger than 8 inches.

Rich and me with our carp!

Time For A Change

Lately, I've been wanting to rearrange the furniture in our bedroom and I finally got around to it the other day. I've always liked the way our room looked before, but after I rearranged it this time, I was so happy because it finally feels homey to me. Here are some pictures of our lovely bedroom!

This is from the door

The corner with the surfboard and closet

From that little chair in the corner looking out to the rest of the house

...and the "Tower O' Organization" as Rich calls it

I would put up some pictures of the rest of our humble abode, but it hasn't been rearranged yet. I'll be sure to post some pictures though as soon as it feels homey though! Until then, I'll give you a little snippet of a living room wall...


This is a painting we got at an art sale downtown a few weeks ago. The tallest mountain in the painting is Mary's Peak (tallest mountain in the Cascades) and Rich and I hiked that a while back. It's really nice and we could see 8 major mountains from the top (Rainier, Hood, St Helens, Adams, Three Sisters, and Bachelor)

Tuna Fishing

So about 2 weeks ago Rich, his brother, Robbie and I all went tuna fishing out on the open sea. We went about 70 miles out and started fishing. It took about 3 hours or so to get out there and it felt like we would hit China pretty soon (I was almost positive) if we kept going. There were 14 of us on the boat and I was one of only 2 girls. On the way out there, I was looking off to the side of the boat (to keep from getting sick) and everyone was looking out at the other side and they got all excited because they saw two whales blowing! I couldn't see thought all the people and fishing poles so I just kept looking out my side. I'm glad I did because as I was sitting there about 50 yards from the boat I see this huge side fin of a whale and it's side like it was waving at just me! A little while later we were looking out the boat some more and all of a sudden we see these gray dorsal fins poke up out of the water and then sink back down. This happened 2 or 3 times and I was thinking...what is that? And then we hit a little wave and two porpoises came splashing out of the water! They were swimming with us along the side of the boat. They came and visited us a number of times for the rest of the trip.

So, on the way out to our "destination" the swells were getting big (8-12 feet) and the boat was rockin' and rollin' making almost everyone sick. I made it the whole way out without getting sick!! I was pretty amazed but I didn't make it out unscathed. I was told that I had a mild case of hypothermia because I got soaked by one of the waves that hit the boat. I had to go inside the cabin area and get warmed up and put dry clothes on (which I didn't have with me so I ended up wearing a mix-match outfit made up of random pieces of crew members' clothing). Now, anyone that has been on a boat on the ocean knows that if you feel sick the last place you want to be is inside a little tiny cabin...that just asking to be sick! Well, the captain made me come inside and made me stay there most of the day until I got warmed up. As I said before, if you're feeling sick you don't want to be in the little cabin area because it just makes things so much worse...and as you can imagine, I got sick. Luckily I was sitting right next to a little bathroom and it was a whole lot closer than the side of the boat (plus it was nice to have a little privacy. It can get a little embarrassing when you're trying to hold up your pants (which are really someone else's sweats) and avoid the boat and other people...) After I was sick for a minute or two, I felt great! I ended up sleeping for a few hours and didn't miss anything.

Anyway, back to the fish catching part because I'm sure no one wants to read about me being sick...

So, there were 14 of us on the boat and we were all ordered the same way that we signed in. Rich was #12, I was #13 and Robbie was #14. Well, when we were fishing we were going over some stuff and the crew was saying that we would be catching fish in the order we signed up so we should remember our numbers. When we would have a fish bite, the first person on the list would reel it in, when the second fish would bite, the second person would reel it in, and so on and so forth. Well, we were out there for quite a while (7 hours to be exact not including the 3 it took to get out there) and there were only 11 fish caught. Oddly enough, Rich caught a fish out of order! He was sitting on the deck and he noticed that there was a fish on one of the poles and so he told the man sitting next to him that there was a fish on, but the man didn't want to reel it in for some reason. After sitting there for almost a minute, Rich decided that he was going to need to reel it in if it was going to get reeled in at all. So he heaved and he hoed and he heaved and hoed some more and up came a tuna! We ended up splitting it between us and Robbie so that he could take some home (it's not fun to go home empty-handed).

The ride back to shore was just fine. Fairly uneventful compared to the trip out there. I heard that there were some whales off to one side of the boat, but I didn't see them. That was okay though, because I had my one whale friend wave to me on the way out.
After our whole deep sea fishing experience Rich and I decided that we were never going to go again. We didn't really have that great of a time and since I was cooped up inside the cabin sleeping and he was stuck outside so he didn't get sick, we didn't get to spend much time together. At least we got a fish! Here are some pictures of the trip and Rich hauling in the "big one".

Warning: Some images may slightly 'graphic'

Homemade Mac and Cheese

So here's that recipe I said I would post if you wanted it!

Three-Cheese Macaroni and Cheese

1 tsp olive oil

1 cup finely chopped onion

2 Tbsp all-purpose flour

1 garlic clove, minced

1½ cups 1% low fat milk

1 bay leaf

½ cup crumbled gorgonzola cheese

¾ cup grated parmigiano - Reggiano cheese, divided

¼ tsp salt

2 cups uncooked elbow macaroni

Cooking spray

2/3 cup shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese

2/3 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)

1/8 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Heat oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add onion to pan; cook 8 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Add flour and garlic; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Stir in milk and bay leaf; bring to a boil. Cook 2 minutes or until thick, stirring constantly with a whisk. Add gorgonzola, ½ cup Parmigiano - Reggiano, and salt; stir until cheeses melt. Discard bay leaf.

Preheat oven to 375.

Cook pasta in boiling water 5 minutes or until almost tender, omitting salt and fat; drain well. Add pasta to cheese mixture, stirring well. Place about ½ cup pasta mixture in each of 6 (1-cup) ramekins coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle evenly with mozzarella. Top evenly with remaining pasta mixture. Combine remaining ¼ cup Parmigiano - Reggiano and panko; sprinkle evenly over pasta mixture. Spray lightly with cooking spray; sprinkle with black pepper. Bake at 375 for 25 minutes or until heated.

Yield: 6 servings

Serving Size: 1 ramekin

So that's the recipe. Here's a picture if you forgot what it looks like :) For the breadcrumbs I just cut up two slices of sandwich bread sprinkled some olive oil on top and put them under the broiler until they were toasty. Also, for the cheeses I just bought the three-cheese italian blend. It worked just fine. Oh and I used whole wheat macaroni noodles. So basically I did my own thing it sounds like...ha ha!

Lately...

So here's what we've been up to these past couple weeks.
Sorry for the long post...I just forget to actually update the blog when things happen sometimes :)

I made some delicious mac and cheese from scratch. If anyone wants the recipe let me know...I'll post it. I even made the little croutons that went on top! I was so happy to finally use my little red skillet dishes we got for our wedding. I never had anything to make in them...now I do!


Our plants are all growing and growing. We even have a tomato that is red...so close to eating time! I had some of our parsley the other night. I was amazed at the difference fresh parsley makes even compared to the "fresh" parsley from the store. Here's one of the flowers growing in a pot. I only have one zinnia that grew. I guess it's trying to make up for all the other that didn't grow because it's about 2 feet tall now and it's huge...all by itself!
Last Saturday we went to the beach. I got a little sunburn and I'm finally enjoying my tan (until I peel that is...which is just starting). Well, it was nice while it lasted. The beach was really nice. It was actually foggy along the whole coast until we got to this little spot that we know and it was sunny right over that area. You could see the fog above the cove on either side, but it was perfectly sunny where we were.

On Sunday after church, we went to this exotic car show near my parents house. There is a Lamborghini dealership in their town and that's where the car show was. It was even free...and we got to sit in some. I sat in this one (but the camera didn't take the picture with me in it)
and then Rich sat in this oneI liked this color and feature combination the best (minus the lights...I like the newest version the best)Here is a fun little car...and by little I mean my size. I sat in a different model and it was just perfect, right size for me, little tiny thing...no fancy stuff to get in the way. I think it was my favorite of all the cars after sitting in them.This was one of my dad's favorite cars there. We went inside the building and when we came back out it was gone. We were sad that we missed it driving off. My dad said that it was a really rare car and Jay Leno has one :)Under another tree they had this. Whenever I hear the name Ferrari anymore, I seem to think of the movie Cars and the little tire guys, Luigi and Guido.Then they had this crazy car parked inside. It's a Spyker c8 and the inside was just crazy! (you should look it up on google.com/images)Hiding in their garage, they had a beautiful car that just says sophisticated without being flashy. I think if you were going to have the money to buy a sporty car but didn't want people to be staring at you everywhere, Aston Martins are a pretty good choice. (People still might stare, but it doesn't really have the same effect as a Lamborghini would)Last but not least, on the way out of the showroom, there was and old JAAAAGGG!
So that's pretty much what we've been up to. I'm getting busy again but not with school (at least not for a few months). I am going to be working full time at my job starting next week until school starts. I'm happy that I'll have something to fill up my time with since Rich is at work all day. This weekend we are going Tuna fishing out on the open sea!! I hope I can reel them in...I hear they fight really hard. (just a tip, don't look up tuna fishing on google images...I did that and it freaked me out. Ours won't be that big (hopefully!)) I'll be sure to take the camera with us but I might be so busy reeling in my huge fish to be taking pictures (just kidding). I'll take some and let you know how it goes!

Our Amazing Weekend And The Festivities Of The 4th

This weekend Rich and I had a great time! I think it was one of the most relaxing weekends we've had in a really long time. On Friday we went to pick cherries (you can read about it in the post directly under this one). In the afternoon, we went down to the river with some friends and got some tubes and floated down the river for about an hour. You get in at the south end of town and then you get out at the north end of town...It was really nice to cool off since it finally got warm! After we floated down the river we went to another place with a rope swing and played in the river some more. Then we went back to our friends house and helped him fix his girlfriends car. After a few hours we cooked up some hamburgers and had a bonfire in their backyard.

On Saturday the 4th, we went back over to our friends house and worked on the car some more (it's turning out to be a big problem because we had to take a lot of the parts out to get to the part we needed). After a few hours of that we had some lunch and then decided to go float down the river again. This time we went even further south before we got in the river so we could float longer. It was a lot of fun. Once we got out we went home to get a quick shower and change. We all met back up at our friends house and we all piled into their big pickup and drove down to the river for fireworks. We hung out for a while and set off some of our own fireworks and then the big fireworks went off.

This is where our amazing weekend had a little bit of a detour to Dullsville...The big fireworks ended up being somewhat of a flop. They only lasted about 10 minutes and it was one firework at a time and the finale was about 5 fireworks at once and that was it!

Can you believe this was the finale? That was literally it.

Maybe that's what fireworks are supposed to be, but I remember having lots and lots of fireworks and having patriotic music playing along with them...and being longer than 10 minutes. It was just really weird. Once we got back to our friends house, they wanted to have another bonfire but it was already about 11:00pm so we went home and went to bed. We were both so tired! I think I finally got some color though, the sun came out and I'm not as white as I was last week...that's always a good sign of a good weekend!

Sunday was our first anniversary! That was a good day too. It was full of it's own ups and downs though. It started out just fine, we got up and went to church and came home afterwards. I actually had some homework to do (because I'm taking a summer class. It's only 4 weeks long though and I started week 3 today so it's almost over and I can have my summer back!). So I had some homework to do and we needed to go grocery shopping. Rich decided to go to the store by himself so that I could get my homework done. When he came back, he had a big bunch of pretty flowers and a candy bar! It was so sweet! I think I'm liking this whole anniversary thing ;)

(The candy bar isn't there becuase it was already consumed :) )

Later that day we decided to go out to dinner. We both thought that Chineese food sounded good and there's a great place in Albany called Pings. So we drive all the way out to Albany to see a sing on the door that says, "Closed for Vacation". I guess everyone went on vacation at the same time or it's a family business or something. Since we were in Albany I went into Old Navy to gram some new flip flops because I actually had holes in my black ones. So then we came back to Corvallis and if we wanted to eat anywhere in Corvallis on 1st street we would need to change. So we went home long enough to change and then went back to 1st street. Once we got out and started walking we saw that not just one restaurant was closed on Sunday, but every single restaurant was closed on 1st street...and 2nd street... We got back into the car and drove to the south end of town becuase we heard about a place down there and when we saw the menu, it didn't look good at all. So we drove back downtown and found a place to eat. It's called Block 15 and it was really good. We ended up driving around for about an hour and a half before we actually ate. All in all, it was still fun, the food was great and I wouldn't want to spend my anniversary any other way than with my wonderful husband! I love you!!

Cherry Time

On Friday morning we went to the house of one of Rich's bosses and picked some cherries. We did this last year too and we still have cherries left but we wanted to pick some more. We ended up picking way too many once again, but we figured we would just dry most of them (thanks to the dehydrator we borrowed from Joann!)

So in order to dry them, we needed to pit them. We had been looking for a pitter everywhere and hadn't found anything. I guess everyone has been out for a couple weeks because cherries are ripening. Luckily we found one and then we found an automatic one (it does lots and lots of cherries really fast). We ended up getting both just so we had a backup one. Here's the thing in action:

Then once they were pitted we put them in the nice dehydrator and let that thing do the rest. We've been drying them for about 2 days now..and we have lots of dried cherries, but we didn't even use half of them up yet!
With the rest of the cherries we decided that we were just going to make fruit leather. I know that we would both eat that up pretty quick :) They are taking up the fridge so we are going to have to do that soon.