My Husband: A chef in the making

So a while ago I purchased some easy cookbooks for Eric to use. He has not really ever cooked before. Now I know you are all wondering well how did he eat before he met you. Well it was a mixture of on-campus food at the Marketplace and the Junction and frozen delicacies that I will not allow in our home such as frozen burritos. So needless to say when we got married I was doing all the cooking, which is fine because I love to cook. But there are times I just don't feel like cooking. Usually when I am feeling exhausted from work and school or under the weather. It is a rare occurrence. However, when I feel that way I don't want Eric to starve or have to eat frozen meals again. This along with the possibility that I may be out of the country for a week this summer motivated me to teach him how to cook. But when I tried to do it from my cookbooks he looked at me like I was speaking a foreign language. In fact I was, chef or cook speak. You know, words like julienne, fold, separate, etc. Words that for him were new and very difficult. So I decided to help him learn cooking starting with the basics. I was lucky enough to find some cookbooks on the American Girl website. Now these books I got because of the fact they had recipes for things like meatloaf, carrot soup and Cincinnati chili. Things that I know Eric would like and they are books we can use later with our children or with any young children we are watching for friends.

Well tonight Eric decided to start trying to cook from scratch with Cincinnati chili. This is partly because he wants to enter the chili cook off at church. So I helped him find spices and measure things and answers questions as they came up. But overall I let him cook on his own. Well when it came time to eat it, I couldn't stop. He did an amazing job. And he is now excited to try again to make it better for the cook-off. Needless to say I think I will be eating chili a few other times this week. So if any of you are in the area please come and help me eat it, because while it delicious I can only have so much. I am mostly excited to see him enter the chili cook-off. I too will be stretching my culinary skills. I am planning on making an apple pie. So Monday evening we will be having apple pie test run one for dessert. So happy cooking to all of you and if you ever find you way to Farmington, New Mexico, please stop by the Winslow's for we will  have some good home-cookin' for y'all!

So here are some of the wedding photos I have been promising since last august. There will be even more one Eric and I choose our prints from Jaylynn Studios. We have just not gotten around to it yet.

If you can't tell we really don't see anyone around us. This shot was the idea of the photographer after my veil attacked Eric

This is my favorite photo, mostly because we were in the shade and near the water fountain.

This one is Eric's favorite. It was a lot of fun to do even though we both wanted to jump into the water.

We really enjoy this photo because the only person that could see us was Dave, the photographer and we were out of the sun.

Here we are with my new in-laws. Yes I finally have sister. We still need to get a copy of the one with my family. 

Smile can do so much!

So while sitting here in Farmington waiting for Eric to return home from measuring an oil well I started to think about something very interesting that happened to me today. Like every day I got up and went to work.  Now for the last couple of days I have been helping to shift books from one shelf to another. Now this is a job that someone with January Webb's amazing ability to organize would excel at. As for me, I am learning and doing better everyday. But the funny thing was that every time I talked to someone I some how was able to make them smile. It wasn't like I was really trying, I was just being myself. I would say something like the fact Sir Issac Newton and his theory of gravity was working against me. Mostly because it seemed like every book I moved just had to fall. Or I would try and laugh at myself when really heavy military history books fell on or squashed my fingers. I guess it all boiled down to my attitude. There are some people that I work with who are real sour pusses. But I don't let them get to me and I have noticed that the more people smile the less sour they seem to be. I guess what all my rambling is about is the amazement that a simple smile or an optimistic word can have so much power over other people's attitude and mood. So to anyone who reads this please try to take sometime in the next few days to pass along a positive word or a sweet smile and watch another person's face lighten up with pleasure and gratitude. You might even surprise yourself.

Funny Dreams make for a Great Day

Ok, so being newlyweds we don't have any kids yet and since we are renting we can have a dog or a cat, but that doesn't mean that we are boring. Being who I am there is never a dull moment in the Winslow house. Take this morning for example. Wednesdays are the one day I can sleep in because I don't have to get up at 7am for work. I still get up and make breakfast and make sure Eric has clean jeans (granted his favorite ones for work are the ones with the hole in an unmentionable place). But this morning he didn't have to go into work due to the fact that he was waiting to hear about a job. SO we got to snuggle together for a while longer. Well while lying there comfortable and war, it happened. I had the weirdest dream ever. Here it is:

I dreamt that me and ALL of my dear friends from Logan, Salt Lake and This is the Place Heritage Park were in a musical version of Pride and Prejudice. This is all I remember I was Jane Bennett and Eric was Charles Bingley. 

Now for the really funny part about an hour later I woke up and was so excited that I remember my dream and that it was so fun I had to tell Eric. Well as you can probably guess he was not amused. First, musicals are not his favorite thing to watch. I will confess that I dragged him to High School Musical 3. He won't admit it but he enjoys musicals. The worst part was that it was Pride and Prejudice. Eric for all his amazing quality is still a manly man and Jane Austen is not his favorite at all. So to say the least he was a little unnerved and worried about his wife. Granted this coming from the man who dreams of playing volleyball and hits me in the chest in the middle of night is not saying much. So in the end we had a good laugh and went on with our day with a slight smile on our faces. I mean how can you fight over laundry or what to eat or how to make the bed (yes we have had newlywed fights, they only last for maybe an hour and then one or both of us apologize) when you are picturing the other singing and dancing in early nineteenth century English clothing. Try it sometime you will find you can't stop smiling or in my case laughing. 

Life is good

So here is the most recent news in the world of Farmington, New Mexico. The Winslow Family is getting ready to... buy their first home. We are really excited, partly because we have done our homework and know what we can afford and have found a townhome we really hope to get. The other big news is that Julia is back in school and loving it. I never thought I would actually miss doing readings or writing a paper but after a semester of not doing it I can honestly say I felt lost. Eric is doing great in his job and is almost done with the 40 plus powerpoint presentations that he has to do to prove he know all he needs to. Then he will be sent to Denver to give a presentation at a conference and then do his first job on his own! We are very excited mostly because it means that he won't have to rely on others to tell him what to do. So this is all for now. We will keep you all updated but for now just know that we are growing up and taking the world by storm!

So we really need that first aid kit

Ok, so those of you who know me really well know that I am a little accident prone. So back in March when we were deciding on items for our wedding gift registries I thought it would be a good idea to put a first aid kit. Considering I have a tendency to get hurt. Well this evening I was getting our chicken ready to go into the oven. I was using one of my new knives to get the butter and trim the chicken itself. Well I was doing great until Eric tried to talk to me and then the knife slipped and cut my finger. Luckily it was jut one layer of skin and it didn't hurt to bad. But now Eric is telling me that I am not allowed to use my knives! I will admit they are sharp but I am usually very careful and everyone has had an oops moment. The worst part was that I knew I needed to wash the finger and get a bandage on it right away but when I asked Eric to go a get me a band aide he didn't know where any were. So with that result I think it is time for me to break down and buy a first aide kit for the kitchen. As my m,om always says it is better to be safe than sorrow. Stay tuned, you never know what I am going to do next!

Life is funny

So I am finally back to my normal self and am really enjoying the new year. One of the things I was thinking about today is how life is so funny at times. For me it is whenever I talk to mother. She is one of a kind and seems to really enjoy sharing her joy with those around her. Today she called to first see if we wanted Utah t-shirts. She was so worried that we would be offended because we are true Aggies. I explained that due to the nature of our football team there is always a little room for us to bleed red. Especially since all three of my brothers go to the U and I will be going to UNM, which are Lobos. The other thing was to relate how she is completely embarrassing my brothers.

This one I really enjoy hearing about because my brothers are so uptight. The first thing I learned as a teenager and tried to impart to my brothers was that mom is going to do what mom wants and if you don't like it just don't give her a reaction. However, they never seemed to realize this and are always completely embarrassed by her dress, manners and just mom being mom. One thing she loves to do is on days when she has no where to go or things to do she stays in her pjs. Now I personally like this idea because it means you are comfortable all day long. But my brothers are mortified that their mother is not dressed and ready for the day all the time. I really don't know why because even when mom is dressed it is more for comfort than for style or glamour. I do have to say though my mother is not the only one to torture in that household, My brothers to their fair share back to her.

The best example of this is back in August. Now mom had brain surgery at the beginning of August to take the excess fluid off her brain. Well she and dad knew that it would take time for her to get back on her feet. I mean come on it is brain surgery not getting a tooth filled or anything. But of course my brothers started pestering her almost right after she got home from the hospital. Now mom did not take this laying down, except for when she was not her pain pills. She found ways to get back at them. By taking the bathroom when they wanted it or making them make their own breakfast. I even think she used the cat water bottle on them more than once with disastrous consequences. (She got soaked). But in the end their pushing did nothing but set her back even more. In September she fell down the stairs and broke her foot. Now this is a testament to my mother's pain tolerance because when she went to the foot doctor, he told her that this foot had been broken before. Well as far as mom knows she never felt the pain she had with the foot before. But anyways she had to wear a boot on her foot for another two months. And she took ever chance to use it as a weapon against insuportant sons. (This would mostly be my oldest brother whose life revolves around driving mom crazy). 

In the end the moral of this story is that our moms can teach us how to have a ton of fun sometimes and also can remind us what happens if we try to cross them. Or at least that is my mom. She is one of a kind and I would not want it any other way.

New Year's Resolutions

So we ll know that as the new year is rung in we all make resolutions to do better at certain things in the coming year. Well I have decided to do better at keeping people informed of what is going on with the Winslows. My other big resolution is to just try and be more patient with my circumstances. This meaning rolling with the punches. 

Everything in Farmington, New Mexico is going well. However our New year's plans were changed due to me being really sick. For some reason Eric try as hard as he may, just did not find me that attractive while blowing my nose and sounding like I am under water. He tried but I too would have a hard time when my nose is sound like a horn and is as red as Rudolph's nose. So we just spent a quiet evening reading and playing computer games and talking. 

The only other big thing is that my parents are back in Utah. Sorry to those in the Midwest that they did not get to see. They enjoyed spending time with Gram but were happy to be home. However the big news is that this time when they returned there was still a lot of money in their bank account. This is because James was in charge of the debt card. And well if any of you know my brother is will not let money be used for just anything. This really frustrated my other two brothers but made my parents very grateful for his stinginess. Also Mom still has the creepy crud and honestly thinks that she might have given it to me through the phone. Of course this is impossible but I just smile and let her think that. Well I better close for now. Eric is tired and I am really starting to feel the Tylenol. Happy New Year and may we all make good on our new year's resolutions.