Eclairs

I love baking and cooking! Although I'm not very good at either...yet. But I guess it just takes practice and trial and error. So, yesterday I found a recipe for mini eclairs on Allrecipes.com and since we had all but one of the ingreidents I decided to make it.

They came out good, I guess. Adam ate them.

(But like a good husband, he eats everything I make...I know he really likes something if he asks me to make it again!) Actually, I liked them too. I got the sugar free vanilla pudding (the filling) on accident, but they still came out pretty good. I thought they tasted like eclairs and that's all that counts! When I first put the dough together it was really sticky, and consequently hard to handle, but they cooked just fine. Anyway, I'll probably try to make them again.

Blueberries!

So as it turns out Adam loves, loves, loves blueberries! (This was one of the first things he told me when we met..."Hi, I'm Adam, I love blueberries." j/k) But he does love blueberries and until I met him I only liked blueberries. But since he loves them and I love him I've come to love blueberries too! (Not to mention they're one of those super-foods, so they're supposed to be extra good for you!)...Well, while we were in North Carolina there was alot of places that had pick-your-own-fruit...unfortunately we didn't go until close to the end of the season...so we onlygot to pick blueberries, which was fine with Adam, but I would have liked to also pick blackberries (which were the two fruits they had there.) Since our work schedule was super crazy most of the time we had to look around for a place that would be open at a time and day we'd be able to go. We found Dr. Young's Pond Berry Farm and woke up early in the morning to drive out there...it should have been about a 30 minute drive, but we got lost and it took almost an hour! But we had a good time picking blueberries!

And apparently for his birthday his mom usually makes him a blueberry pie! He was still in Utah during his birthday this year and I was in North Carolina; but I got a great recipe for blueberry pie and went to the store to get all the ingredients and I planned on making it for him as soon as he got to NC...well two months later I still hadn't made the pie! So I few weeks before we were supposed to go back to Utah we started clearing out our cupboards and refrigerator and we found two cans of blueberry pie filling. (Which I don't remember buying but the pie I was going to make called for fresh blueberries) I still had the pre-made pie crust so I made a blueberry pie with that and the blueberry pie filling. I added a sweet crumb topping to try to mix it up a bit. The result was super sugary and good pie. I wouldn't make the blueberry like that again, I'd use fresh blueberries, but Adam ate the whole thing!

My New Camera

I would hope this post would be all about my new camera...but I don't actually have a new camera to gush about...You see, no matter how financially stable you were before you got married, after you have no extra money to spend. haha...or at least that's how I think it works.

I bought a Cannon 4MP camera 5 years ago that has served me well. It was cutting-edge when I bought it, but now, 4MP seems so out dated. But truthfully I would keep the camera and use it but recently the flash stopped working. (It's probably something that's easily fixable.) So I figure my only recourse is to buy a new one. So I'm doing what any normal person that's strapped for cash would do...buy it off of ebay! I've been checking ebay for the past week for a good deal on a nice camera...and by nice I mean 6MP...haha...well, we'll see what happens. I'm sure I'll get one eventually...then I'll post tons of awesome pictures on here! =)

Timpanogos Storytelling Festival

This past weekend Adam and I volunteered at the 21st Annual Timpanogos Storytelling Festival. We did it last year and it was completely boring! It was an all day thing and we really didn't know what to exact and we didn't really like the story tellers we heard. But this year was different. Adam was a Tent Manager and I was a Tent Host...we had official duties this time. We were in charge of the Cottonwood Tent and Saturday Morning the first storyteller in our tent was a first-timer to the Timp Storytelling Festival. His name is Antonio Sacre, he's a national storyteller. It was his first time to Utah and first time he had been immersed in the LDS culture. He was by far my favorite storyteller. His story was about a little Cuban girl visiting her grandma in Miami. It's called, La Noche Buena: A Christmas Story. The story is actually published as a book and will be available for sale on November 1st. In fact, they were selling a few copies at the festival, but when I went to the tent to buy one, they were all gone. But he was an excellent storyteller and I really enjoyed his story.

All of the other storytellers were pretty good too. We worked all day in the Cottonwood Tent and had the opportunity listen to quite a few story tellers. Another story teller I liked was a woman who's name started with a D, who told a story about child birth. Alot of the people in the audience could relate to what she was saying because they were older women who presumably all had given birth at least once.

One thing I noticed about the storytellers was that people liked them more when they could identify with their stories. (It sounds obvious--and it is). But what I noticed is that here, in Utah County, there is a very unique culture that you won't find anywhere else in the county. People are more conservative and their values and way of life are a little different then anywhere else. So when Antonio got up and told his story about a little Cuban girl people loved the story--probably because it was heartwarming and genuine and told superbly, but the next story teller was a guy named Bil (yes, just 1 L) Lepp...I think that was his last name. He is a Utah native (non-LDS) and a farmer...his story was not that great, but everyone LOVED him...and I thought it could be in part because more people could identify with his story about being in boy scouts and farming and things like that. Anyway, it seems obvious that people would like stories they can relate to just like people think comedians that poke fun of stuff they are familiar with are the funniest.

Overall, the weather was nice and our 9 hours of volunteering went by rather quickly. And sadly, this is the only picture I have from that day.