The New Guy

Our family has grown yet again! Allow me to introduce you to the newest member of our little family: Leo!

He is an English Shepherd that we got from the great people at Walnut Ranch, conveniently located about 25 miles from our home. We got a chance to visit a few weeks ago and meet Afton, who's responsible for all the wonderful dogs at Walnut Ranch; Leo's parents, Red and Rachel (two of the best looking and best behaving dogs ever); and our little Leo himself. We also played with Leo's brothers and sisters - how can you not play with so many adorable little puppies!

Meeting Little Leo for the First Time

He's still adjusting to our home, but is beginning to settle in a little more. And the cats are doing surprisingly well with this sudden addition. Frank keeps trying to play with Leo through the play pen (we've got Leo confined to the kitchen so the cats can take their time getting used to him and so that if he has any "accidents" it's not on carpet) and Ellie hopped over the gate and has been observing him from the kitchen table. They've both even come up behind him to sniff him while he's distracted with a chew-toy.

Hopefully things keep going they way they are. If so, I don't think he'll have any problem fitting in.

Holly Jolly Christmas

Decorating for Christmas is always a very fun event - Christmas music, hot chocolate, cats eating ornaments, and twinkling lights is a magical combination. It was so much fun being able to decorate our house this winter. We already had quite a few Christmas decorations, but we did add a bit without spending too much. I will be keeping my eyes out for discounted Christmas items at the end of the month for next year!

The best parts of decorating for me this year were putting up outside lights for the first time and decorating our mantle. I especially love our new fox friend from Target. We inherited Jeremy's box of Christmas ornaments earlier this year, so it was fun to go through them, relive some memories and hang them on the tree. And now for the picture extravaganza:

Our New Christmas Moose!

A Little Christmas Dumbo From Disney World

The Cats Helping to Decorate

  

We celebrated Christmas on the 15th as we are very busy during the week of Christmas with traveling. We saw The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, went to Outback Steakhouse for dinner, and then came home and opened presents with the cats. What a perfect night!

Merry Christmas to you all, and have a blessed New Year!

The Happiest Place on Earth

If you haven't noticed, we've been pretty absent on here recently and it's because we are recovering from our vacation to Disney World! The week after Thanksgiving we were able to take a trip to Florida with my family. It was a blast and one of the really fun things about going at this time of year is that they have the parks all decorated for Christmas. Everything looked so festive and pretty!

Jeremy and I drove instead of flying, which added some time to our trip, but it was worth it! We love a good road trip and it gave us the opportunity to eat Oreo's, Cheez-its, and at Cracker Barrel (a family trip staple of mine). We also listened to some comedian's CDs which always creates a lot of inside jokes (Mike Birbiglia and Jim Gaffigan are some of our favorites!).

Juice at the Florida-Georgia State Line

During our four-day trip to Disney World, we were able to spend a lot of time with family and see all of the sights in the parks. My family is a little Disney World-obsessed, so it was fun to immerse Jeremy in that. On Tuesday, we explored Epcot. We were able to eat a lot of different foods from the different countries in World Showcase, including fried pineapple in Canada (which was delicious!), chicken teriyaki in Japan, and margaritas in Mexico! That night, we walked through the Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights at Hollywood Studios. It is a street with buildings on both sides, completely covered in lights. The lights are timed to music; for one song, practically everyone in the street paused to just watch and enjoy. That was really cool!

Christmas in Shorts

Our Lovely French Pastries

On Wednesday, we spent the whole day at Magic Kingdom, which is my favorite of the four parks. We rode ton of things and enjoyed being able to take turns taking my four nieces and nephews on rides. I had a kid's hand in mine basically the whole day! My oldest nephew is tall enough to ride some of the faster, adult rides now, and it was really fun to ride with him for his first time on Splash Mountain. We were all singing like crazy people and at the end he said the ride was amazing!!! That night, Jeremy and I watched the Main Street Electrical Parade and Celebrate the Magic. I had never seen Celebrate the Magic before, and it was very cool. They do projector work on the castle and show images of movies among other things on it. It's hard to describe!

Little Nephew Busting a Move

Thursday was a bit more relaxed day - Jeremy and my parents and I headed to Hollywood Studios to ride some of the "big kid rides." My dad still enjoys roller coasters so I was glad they could come with us! We all rode on Toy Story Mania (an arcade-type game), and then my dad, Jeremy, and I went on the Tower of Terror and Rock 'n' Roller Coaster. My parents left, Jeremy and I finished up the park with The Great Movie Ride and Muppet Vision 3-D, and then Jeremy and I parted ways. I headed back to Magic Kingdom to catch up with the rest of my family and Jeremy headed to the pool back at the hotel! It was a fun afternoon that included a round of Dole Whips (pineapple flavored ice cream that you can only get at one of the food stands at Magic Kingdom) and carousel rides. That night, Jeremy and I went out to dinner. We went to Giordano's which is a favorite of ours when we're in Chicago (or Orlando, apparently).

On Friday we spent the day at Animal Kingdom. My youngest niece really loves animals, so it was fun to go through the zoo portion of the park with her. For lunch we had our first ever character meal. We ate at Tusker House Restaurant; Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Goofy and even Mickey were there! The kids were very excited! It was delicious food which made for a fun (and a little hectic) meal! Friday night we headed to Downtown Disney to wrap up our trip.

Christmas Tree at Animal Kingdom

Hippos on the Safari

"Look at that duck!"

Festival of the Lion King

The Big Mouse Himself

"That's my fish"

On Saturday on the way back to Indiana, we stopped in Tifton, Georgia at Adcock Pecans. Whenever my family and I went to Florida, we always stopped there, and I wanted to show Jeremy. He loved it. This place is filled with jams, sauces, and pecans! We bought a few things that I'm excited to try!

That's a Lot of Nuts!

Overall, it was a fantastic trip. It was so fun to be there with the whole family, especially the kids. I'm like a kid at Disney World too, so it was a blast. We created a lot of memories, and I am so thankful for our vacation!

Thanksgiving Feasting

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving last week! We had a great time visiting with family up in Fort Wayne and now both look like Frank does in the picture below - sleepy, lazy, and relaxed. We won't be posting anything major for a week or so, but I wanted to at least get something up. So here are recipes for two of the things we brought up to contribute to the Thanksgiving feast.

The Recipes

Blackberry / Apple Crisp (adapted from Allrecipes)

4 Apples

8 oz Blackberries

2 Cups Flour

2 Cups Rolled Oats

1-1/2 Cups Brown Sugar

1 Cup (2 Sticks) Butter

1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon

1/2 Teaspoon Ground Nutmeg

Pinch of Salt

Preheat the oven to 350. Peel, core, and slice the apples, mix them with the berries, and then set aside. Combine the flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt in a large bowl. Cut the butter into this mixture until crumbly. Place half of the mixture on the bottom of a 9"x13" baking dish, place the apple/berry mixture on top of it, and then cover that with the rest of the flour mixture. Bake for about 45 minutes or until apples are tender.

Cheesecake Cookie Bars (adapted from Bashful Bao)

For the Cookie Layer

1 Cup Butter

1 Cup Brown Sugar

2 Eggs

1 Teaspoon Vanilla

1-1/2 Cups Flour

Pinch of Salt

1-1/2 Cups Chocolate Chips

1-1/2 Cups Peanut Butter Chips

For the Cheesecake Layer

16 Ounces Cream Cheese

2/3 Cup Sugar

2 Eggs

2 Teaspoons Vanilla

Preheat the oven to 375 and grease a 9"x13" baking dish. Make the cookie layer first. Melt the butter and then mix with the brown sugar. Then mix in the eggs, vanilla, and salt. Once everything is well integrated fold in the flour. Then fold in the chocolate and peanut butter chips, but reserve some to sprinkle on top later. Once everything is well combined spread two-thirds of the dough on the bottom of the baking dish. Then make your cheesecake layer, which is super easy. Just combine everything in a bowl until well mixed and smooth. Then spread this over the cookie dough in the dish, drop the rest of the cookie dough over the cheesecake randomly, and then sprinkle the remaining chocolate and peanut butter chips over that. Place in the oven and bake for 30 to 40 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

End Results

Both recipes turned out nicely. I had made the crisp before, so I knew that would be good, and just look at the recipe for the bars - how could they not be good? Both were big hits at both Thanksgivings we attended, so it seems we aren't the only ones who liked them.

I modified both recipes, but not much (I've written it out above with my modifications). Blackberries seemed like a good way to add a bit of colour and a little extra flavor to the crisp. Apple pie was already being provided at Thanksgiving, so having just plain apple crisp might have been a little redundant. I also elected to use two Braeburn apples and two Granny Smith apples for even more diversity of flavor. The combo worked well and I'll probably use those two again next time. I didn't bother using peanut butter cups for the bars since that sounded like it would be more work - why bother chopping up peanut butter cups when I could just mix in peanut butter chips? I also doubled the recipe because we had a lot of people to feed. And I added a pinch of salt. Just because these are desserts doesn't mean they shouldn't be well seasoned. It's science, look it up.

Final Thoughts

These are both good recipes and I'm sure we'll be using them again (although not often because holy crap that's a lot of butter). Improvements could probably be made - maybe a caramel to go with the crisp or perhaps a strawberry or raspberry drizzle for the bars. I'll try playing with those options next time and see how things turn out. Let me know in the comments if there are any other changes you think could be good. It would be nice to get a little more interactive with ya'll. :) 

Thanks for reading and have a great week!