Beautiful Colorado

For the third year in a row, I was lucky enough to be invited along on Joel's family ski trip. Also for the third year in a row, we had perfect* weather. I only took photos on one day, but you can get the idea. This was at Copper Mountain, Colorado.

In braggart news, Joel would not allow me to ski a single green. I started on blues on the first morning and was skiing down blacks by that afternoon. We even tackled black moguls.

*The weather was perfect 3/4 days we were there. On the fourth day, the wind was gusting over 60 mph at the top of the mountain. I had hurt my knee (a woman collided with me) beforehand, so I stayed in that day. Again, perfect weather.

Here are some shots of the two of us tackling black moguls (aka proof):

Austin Kite Festival

I have always wanted to go to the kite festival, but it is usually scheduled for one of the first weekends in March. It usually rains that weekend and is pushed back to Spring Break, when I am gone. Therefore, I have never been able to go.

Until this year. Thank you, massive drought.

The Austin Kite Festival is held at Zilker Park, the same place as ACL and numerous other cool things. It's got one large field that generally has tons of kites, but this is just obscene(ly awesome).

Joel and I tried to be eco-friendly and drive to downtown, then take the shuttle to the park. Well, the line wrapped around the building. We parked in some overflow parking near the river and walked the rest along Lady Bird Lake Trail. Then we flopped down on the grass and took in the sights. Might not have been worth a 3 year wait, but it was pretty awesome.

Oh, and we brought Iggy. She enjoyed the random loving-on and rolling in the grass.

Here's a collection of some of the cooler sights:

The Lasanga Disaster

Joel and I have become good friends with a local couple, Liz and David. I met Liz while teaching. She was a permanent substitute in the Health Sciences Career Building. After they found a certified teacher, she wanted to get her certification. About the same time, I decided I wanted nothing to do with teaching (and my certification). I tutored her for the exam; she fed me her should-be-famous smashed sandwiches.

I am happy to report that she PASSED her science composite exam and is well on her way to being a certified teacher. The two of us now come over for potluck dinners and catching up.

Tonight, however, we already had dinner plans. We were making mexican lasagna. It looked pretty good in the cookbook and the directions were simple: assemble, bake for 30 minutes, remove from oven. Easy, right? The only change we made was a wider pan to make more in one go. Once we put it in the oven, I realized I needed to go get something from Liz. We figured we had 30 minutes; this was a perfect window to run this errand.

Mistake. Thirty minutes turned out to be a little over an hour away from home. David is a bona fide entertainer and will revile you with stories while refilling your wine glass. When we pulled into the driveway, we could already hear the fire alarm beeping. The front door opened to rolling waves of smoke.

Here is what the cookbook showed as the final project:

Here is ours:

The odd thing is that even with the double amount of time in the oven, the dish was fine, actually delicious, once you peeled off the burnt top. It might have helped that by now it was 9pm and we were a little tipsy with empty stomachs.

My 22nd Birthday

When you turn 22, you start to lose coolness. Up to now, every birthday was one step towards cool-dom. Heck, I could even shop at Forever 21 yesterday and feel righteous.

Joel made it up with a pretty adorable birthday.

He knows I am a pancake fiend. Last year for Christmas he got me a pancake pen. These let you draw the batter into whatever shapes you want. These were the most heartwarming and delicious pancakes ever!








He also brought home a bouquet of one of my favorite flowers. Neither of us can remember the name of them. Joel keeps a close up photo of them on his iPhone and shows it to the florist whenever he needs them. It works for us.

The tablecloth pictured was a beautiful birthday present from his mother, Lori.

And, of course, we had a delicious dinner with recipes from The Pioneer Woman.