Dracula by Bram Stoker

This book has been on my 'to read' list for quite a while. About this time is when I start getting excited about Halloween and thought it would be a great start! It's always interesting to read a book written over a hundred years ago. I found this one particularly interesting because it's actually written as a compilation of letters, newspaper clippings, and diary entries.

Literary vampires have come a long way in the last century it seems. The Count wasn't all sparkly in the sun, and better yet, he could control wolves. The Twilight debate of Edward vs Jacob becomes much less interesting if Edward ever gets wind of that information.

So the real question should be Edward Cullen vs Count Dracula.

You've got a perpetual high school student who's shiny and melodramatic and likes to creep by teen girl's beds at night while they sleep or a rich creepy old guy with a giant rundown castle in Transylvania and an uncanny knowledge of late 19th century British real estate laws.

You know what, you can have them both, I'll take Eric.

What's for dinner?

A blog series about, what else? What we had for dinner!

Monday: Labor Day Picnic Our first BBQ experience! More about it here.


Tuesday: Labor Day BBQ leftovers! The thing about having any type of party is you end up with a ton of extra food! Leftovers will be a recurring theme this week! We did mix it up by creating some cheese fries!

Wednesday: Vegetarian Burgers and Carrot Soup (aka leftovers) It's class day! Veggie Wednesday, ftw.



Thursday: Dinner with Jen. Always a favorite part of my week! This week we met at Elephant bar for a fun happy hour.

Friday: Romantic Dinner out with my Husband. As one of our wedding gifts, we received a gift certificate for The Melting Pot. Dating married men is so much more fun! :p


Saturday: Top Ramen. My old college favorite! :)

Sunday: Fish and Chips. I think we are addicted to the deep fryer!

Hiking: Crystal Cove State Park

While Sara was visiting, she, Gavin and I decided to head out to Crystal Cove State Park for a hike. So we packed up some water, a fake picnic and off we went!


A quick look at the weather or forecast may have been a good plan, but instead we cheerily left for our adventure. We found a place to park at one of the trial heads. The only problem is we parked at the top of the trail head. Therefore, the first half of our hike was downhill. the second half was uphill. We eventually settled on a hike we estimated to be about three miles long (our estimate was almost correct).

It was hot, and long, but quite pretty.




When we got back to the car, it informed me it was 110 degrees. The lower part of the park was 75 degrees and overcast. Lesson learned: next time we'll check the weather.

Labor Day: Our first BBQ.

What's more All American than a holiday dedicated to the start of the football season, the end of summer, and celebrating working by not working? Celebrating it with a BBQ!

A bit on a whim and very last minute, Gavin and I sent out some text messages to people we thought might be free, took a trip to Home Depot, and bam! BBQ.

Thank you for the BBQ, Jen!

Since it was last minute, we decided to keep it pretty simple for food (and it was our first time using the new bbq!).

Gavin made some delicious potato salad from a recipe his mommy gave us. We've made it before and I always really like it. Although I never realized, until eating it yesterday for lunch without a fork, how oily it is. Still delicious!

We also made some grilled veggies to put on the bratwurst. It was very spicy and probably my least favorite of our days creations but was still good.

Gavin and Chris manned the grill making hamburgers, brats, and veggie burgers.

Meanwhile, I used our new deep fryer to make some homemade fries and onion rings. I didn't really want a deep fryer, but I admit it's pretty fun.
Our timing was a bit off for getting everything completed, but no one seemed to mind. The onion rings were a HUGE hit and I didn't even manage to get a picture after being cooked before they were all eaten!

Bobby: Photo bombing since the 80's

Alyssa made a delicious desert cookie cake and I cheated with store brownies.

There is no more lovely way to spend a free summer afternoon than surrounded by good food and great friends! Happy Labor Day!

Our Honeymoon!

In anticipation of some wedding posts that might be happening soon, I thought I'd put up a quick recap or our honeymoon. Or at least the travel portion of our honeymoon. I think our honeymoon is still going on. :)

Jamaica!

It was about three weeks before the wedding and Gavin and I still hadn't booked our Honeymoon. My original desire to go to the ice hotel didn't mesh well with a July Wedding, and our disappointment with the apparently new management of Paw's Up Resort in Montana left us frustrated and we just kept putting it off. Finally, Gavin took charge, and booked us a trip to Iberostar Grand in Montego Bay. As usual, I wasn't sure of it, but Gavin did such a perfect job with Hawaii, how could I ever doubt him again??

We opted to leave on Monday, which looking back I think was a great idea despite my initial skepticism. Before we left, I insisted all wedding planning paraphernalia had to be stashed. I didn't really care where or in what state, I just didn't want to look at it anymore! We also had a chance to open our gifts and enjoy our first night home as a married couple!

We red-eyed it to South Carolina and then flew into Montego Bay. I wore my awesomely awesome wedding day sweatsuit and Bride shirt Sara had made for me. I got the most comments, not surprisingly, from other brides who shared our wedding date.

The nice thing out Jamaica, is there's pretty much nothing to do. I mean, they have some touristy things, but overall, it's quite easy to just spend your days lounging around the resort or in your room. What better honeymoon activity is there!?

The resort is all inclusive. Meaning it includes twice (or three times?) as much food and ten times as much drink as you would normally consume. Things really went down hill when we realized that room service was also included...

Most evenings it was rainy, but I liked the rain and it didn't even manage to keep us out of the pool!



We did leave the resort a few times. Our favorite trip was to Dunn Falls, a hiking waterfall about an hour away from the resort by bus.

FOR CHCK'N

The trip included a catamaran ride and snorkeling, which was not as much fun as the one in Hawaii, but it was still fun and the falls were amazing (except the rather uncoordinated and out of shape climbing partners we were stuck with).

We also took a trip to the 'shopping district' which was a complete bust, but was across the street from Rose Hall, a restored plantation that is alleged to be haunted by a mistress who killed three husbands in the house before being killed there herself.
The only 'other worldly' presence we sensed was the almost unbearable heat and humidity. I thought Gavin was going to pass out! Whatever else you say about Rose Hall, it does have one heck of a view!


To satisfy the 'active' part of my vacationing (besides the hike of course), we took a parasail ride at the resort. I'll admit the laid back staff and creaking ropes frayed my nerves a bit, but it was awesome and I'm so glad we were able to do it together.

We likely won't be going back to Jamaica, but it was a memorable honeymoon.

What's for dinner?

A blog series about, what else? What we had for dinner!

Monday: Spaghetti at Mom's Nothing beats mom's Spaghetti. Seriously, mom makes some awesome sauce. My home grown tomatoes also made an appearance (not in the sauce) but in the appetizer below.







Tuesday: Strip Steak and Homemade Bloomin' Onion. For our one month anniversary, the ever awesome Gavin made me a delicious steak dinner in the style of (but better than) our old bad habit of Outback Steakhouse after ceramics class It was our first time using the deep fryer and the results were very good!




Wednesday: Vegetarian Pizza with Alyssa Before Class, Alyssa came over and we made a vegetarian Pizza with some supplies she picked up at a farmers market. It was delicious!



Thursday: Some Stuff Literally, I ate some stuff for dinner. I made the decision to try a 5k run. I made it, but didn't have the energy left to cook. So I ate a hard boiled egg and some tomatoes. For everyone's sake, I skipped photos of this, interesting, dinner.

Friday: Steak and Potatoes and Carrot and Orange Soup. My College roommate Sara came to visit so we made her one of our favorite steak recipes.


Saturday: Spaghetti Nests by Amy I thought I could do just as good or better than Rachel Ray Pasta Nests. They came out really quite good.


Sunday: Spicy Asian Noodle Soup. We love this soup. It's a Rachel Ray recipe and it's quick, easy, healthy and tasty. Everything I look for in a recipe!


I am currently planning an entire post about our very first BBQ! So much fun!

What's for dinner?

Monday: Clam Chowder care of Commerce Casino Commerce isn't known the world over for their culinary expertise, but I certainly couldn't have asked for better company than Jen and Heather and even a few minutes with Gavin! They also made a pretty awesome looking peach martini for Heather, although I stuck with the Cab.


Tuesday: Brie and hard cheddar with crackers and Sauvignon Blanc . Okay, in reality this was our dessert, but it was delicious and pretty. :)



Wednesday: Garlic and Rosemary Chicken with sweet Potato. I was pretty proud of this meal. Gavin and I decided we should find out, and eat, what was in our freezer. We had a ton of chicken. I defrosted a piece of chicken with no idea what I was going to do with it. I decided to cut it up and saute it with garlic and rosemary. The whole house smelled amazing! I ended up making another one for Gavin to eat when he got home.



Thursday: Sweet Potato. While my chicken stole the show, I also remembered that I LOVE sweet potato. How do I keep forgetting that?? Five minutes in the microwave=delicious.


Friday: Surfin Souvlaki I had a Greek Breakfast burrito which was quite good. Gavin and I have been trying to scoop out new places to eat and this is on the way to the jewelers (I was on my way to get my ring cleaned 6 down, 94 to go.)

Saturday: Sushi, Green Valley Ranch Sautrday, we drove to Vegas to visit my parents for Gavin's Birthday. We watched the UFC ( tear for BJ) and then ate Sushi.

Sunday: Battista's Hole in the Wall, Las Vegas Sautrday, we drove to Vegas to visit my parents for Gavin's Birthday. We meet up with Dustin and he took us to this cute little resturant at the Strip and Flamingo.

So not only am I late, but I hardly even cooked! This week isn't shaping up to be a spectacular cooking week, as we weren't able to grocery shop over the weekend, but we'll see what we come up with!