Happy Anniversary!

Four years ago, it would have been hard to imagine loving you more than I did that day we walked, hand in hand, out of the temple. Now, with four years more of getting to know you, through our ever-evolving lives, I am so glad we have forever! I really lucked out. You continue to amaze me by how thoughtful you can be, how patient you are, and how much kindness and love you can express.

You have an amazing way of making the things I love that much more pleasing (I even tell you food taste better when you are around, and I'm not kidding!) and all the stressful situations seem lighter. You are an amazing example to Jackson (and I hope he turns out to be more like you than me). I love seeing your excitement for Zoe to come join us. You haven't lost your sense of curiosity and adventure that made me fall in love with you in the first place, and your honesty and integrity make me look up to you (even if you are a little too honest sometimes). In short, I'm glad to have you as my best friend and companion in this life and beyond, because you make it all worth it and all that much more exciting!
Happy anniversary Babe! I love you more than ever! I'm looking forward to spending the weekend at Sundance, hiking, riding horses, and making clay pots and all that fun stuff you have planned....thanks for the surprise!

Our Japanese Friends

A week ago Monday, I got an e-mail from Lindon City asking for host families to open their homes for about 300 international students traveling abroad on a music tour. I thought it would be a cool opportunity, and with Brian's permission, replied to the e-mail. I didn't hear back for several days after I filled out the required information, so I assumed we were not accepted. Last Sunday night, we finally got correspondence back saying we were being sent 2 teenage boys from Noto, Japan, and we needed to pick them up the following day.

Had I known that I would have another leak in my ceiling, and what I could have sworn was strep throat at the beginning of the week (not really, but it felt that way), I may have changed my mind about the whole thing. But we just went with it, and it has been a fun experience.

I am really unfamiliar with the Japanese culture, but I am really impressed with these boys, Shogo and Hide (he-day). They are so polite and well mannered. Their regimen is strict. They don't sleep past 6am, and if we sleep in past 7am, they come looking for us (we feed them breakfast in the morning and drop them off at 8am, which should be plenty of time, but they get nervous I think)!

At first, neither one spoke much English and the barrier was difficult, but they got better every day. We mostly feed them breakfast and lunch, and them drop them off or pick them up at their car-pool destination. Their days are packed with activities, performances, and workshops, and they come home tired. Most of our time with them is spent around the table. They learned to fold their arms like we do, and think it's funny to see Jackson fold his arms automatically. We have given them a couple of turns to pray in Japanese (they pray to Buddha), which is cool.

When they like a meal, they say "thank you," but when they LOVE a meal, they say "very good" or "Delicious." Their favorites have been pancakes, peach cobbler with ice cream, spaghetti, steak, and scrambled eggs with sausage. And they all but lick the plate clean. They also like the mountains and the views from our house. Jackson has warmed up to them and likes to be the center of attention. He goes around giving them "rocks" and high fives, and waves goodbye in the morning.

These are gifts they brought us from Japan: a fancy set of chop sticks, a beautiful etched Japanese box with grapes on it, Yin that mean "ties or bind" and a festival style headband .

They showed us origami, and we showed them how to play checkers and say "king me." The week has gone by really fast. They play tonight at the orem owls game, which we plan to watch depending on the weather, and leave Sunday Morning. I hope they've enjoyed it here!

Yoga Classes

I am starting Yoga classes again! This time they will be offered on both Tuesday AND Thursday evenings. This will be a 3 month (12 week) course starting in September and lasting through November. One evening will be reserved for those of you who are interested in Restorative Yoga (great for prenatal/postpartum, or calming the mind and body before bedtime) and the other evening will be geared towards the Vinyasa Flow style of yoga (more intensive stretching, strength training, higher impact). Both will give you benefits of getting lean and limber before the holidays!
If you have been to my classes before, you have an idea of what to expect. I hope that by separating into two classes, I can tailor fit a yoga routine for you.
Classes will be semi-private, consisting of at most, 5 people. They will be held once a week at my home yoga studio for 1 hour from 8-9pm. I am leaning towards teaching restorative on Thursdays and the Primary Vinyasa series on Tuesdays, but this may change as we get closer to September, or depending on your responses.
I'm excited to open my yoga studio to you! (We finally have a place togo, instead of meeting in living rooms and club-houses!) . Classes will be $7.50 per class. I ask that this be paid in advancefor the 12 week course ($90), similar to what you would expect from agym membership. Hopefully this will give you the incentive to come each week, and I won't be left hanging with a less-than-full class if you can't make it a few times.
If you have a friend or a visitor that would like to come with you once in a while, they can pay as theycome. Please call in advance for permission to make sure there is roomin the class (my studio will only hold so many!).
Reservations:Please e-mail me which day you are interested in, and I will hold a spot for you. The class will be closed once 5 people sign up, and spots are fillingup! There are only a couple of spots left in eac class. Can't waitto see you there!
If you have any questions, please feel free to e-mail or call!
Namaste! Chelsea

A new way to Polish your Silver

I read this post MONTHS ago on a friends blog (I hope she doesn't mind me adding this link to her post...). I finally got around to trying it out and was so impressed, I had to pass the idea along.

I got a really nice thing from my mom for Christmas, it was a cool way to store jewelry, using hooks. The idea was great, because you could see what you actually have, instead of digging through a jewelry box, but I think it would've worked better with beaded things (most of my jewelry is silver, and it tarnished almost immediately).

Well, 5 months later, I finally got around to polishing that tarnished silver. I am excited to have my jewelry back! Check it out....
http://zinke.wordpress.com/2008/01/04/polish-your-silver/

This week in our lives....

Brian and I started the weekend off with a great date up the canyon. We use to hike a lot, and to be honest, it's been a while. I loved it. It's always beautiful when you can get away from the city and be in nature. Grandma and Grandpa Beutler watched Jackson for us for a couple of hours. The time just flew by, before we knew it, we had be gone 3 hours! It was great!
Hiking with Brian means never hiking on a well known path or trail. We basically bush-whack our way through things, and that's half the fun. This one was straight up a mountain river bed, half the time our feet in water (why didn't I wear my montrels? I should have known better)! But because we don't use the typical path, we get to see some gorgeous sites that not many others get to enjoy. Can you see my baby bump? 5 months prego!!

Next, we took Jackson to the Zoo. This was his second time, but probably his first interaction that he enjoyed the animals and things. We didn't take too many pictures of this because I'm not one for taking pictures of animals behind cages...but the elephants and the giraffes were his favorite! He was fascinated by how big they were, and the tongue of the giraffe as it tried to get leaves off of a tree. It was a short stay at the zoo...hot and crowded, but it was good enough for us. We got our fill of the zoo for a while...

Finally, we had a BBQ up the canyon with some friends. Luckily, Ethan's sister was smart enough to bring a bunch of balls to play with...Jackson was in Heaven! He is such a boy and loved this little t-ball set. He'd be happy with just placing the ball on the stand, but of course, dad had to show him how to really hit! I think they both loved it.

Greek Pasta Salad

This week, we have a 3 different family BBQ's and one ward celebration to attend, with the requirement of bringing a salad to share. I love side dishes, and I love not having to cook the main meal for half the week! For one of the gatherings, I'm making this salad. It's pretty tasty, but it's definitely got the Mediterranean flair, so if you don't like feta cheese and black olives...this one's not for you! Our family loves flavor, so we love this one...



INGREDIENTS

Dressing:
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons garlic powder
1 1/2 teaspoons dried basil
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
3/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
3/4 teaspoon white sugar

Salad:
1 bag of cooked pasta (i used bowtie, not the family size)
15 cherry tomatoes, halved
1 sliced red bell peppers
1 chopped cucumber
1 bag baby spinach
3/4 cup crumbled feta cheese
1/2 cup chopped green onions, optional
1 (4 ounce) can whole black olives

DIRECTIONS
In a large bowl, whisk together olive oil, vinegar, garlic powder, basil, oregano, black pepper, and sugar. Add cooked pasta, tomatoes, red peppers, cucumber, feta cheese, green onions, olives, and spinach. Toss until evenly coated. Cover, and chill 2 hours or overnight.

Sometimes it could use a little salt, but that's basically it. Pretty easy!

Before and Afters

ok. I'm finally getting around to it. I hadn't realized how few "before" pictures we have of the home until now. Those of you who have been to visit, will appreciate the many changes we made! Some of these photos were taken off of the actual home tour listing... and had we looked at the home on-line first, we would have never scheduled a walk through. There was so much frilly wallpaper and trimming!

But since we drove by the home first, we fell in love with the curb appeal and scheduled the walk-through from there. Actually seeing the home in person was the selling point. We saw so much potential! Little did we know what amount of work that "potential" would require!







We removed so much wallpaper, repainted just about everything in every room, re-textured walls, new light fixtures, new carpet, new kitchen, you name it. And we are just getting started! I hesitate to call any of these "after" pictures because they are still in the works (as you can see, this mud room closet still needs a door).

Many of these projects I have done while Jackson is sleeping, or when Brian is on a trip (I was really busy while he was in Israel!). Needless to say, my card making has taken a back burner for other crafty hobbies! Hope you like what you see!

Maybe I should have kept this carpet? What do you think?

Old Kitchen....we sold all of it on KSL! You can read my old post about that....cabinet doors were falling off, appliances didn't work. Etc., etc.

New Kitchen, we still are working on the window area and placing the outlet covers on. But at least I have a stove!

More of that frilly wallpaper that had to go!! I love my polka dot pigs!! We are going to replace the faucet next, right Brian?

More wallpaper....we turned this room into the playroom. It's pretty cute and I got my color inspiration from Stampin up! We decided to put carpet here (it use to be a blue wood floor), because it's a playroom and kids wrestle...enough said. Don't mind the mess. We also made a cute little cubby space just for kids. Can't say enough about that wallpaper though!

Here is the parlor. We didn't change much, just painted, but I love this room. It's my favorite and the ceiling is sooo cool!

This is the master bedroom. I don't have any "after" pics, I haven't had a chance to decorate it yet, and we still have work....but wait and see! Our bathroom has no light fixtures yet and is only textured and primed. But we have a lot of plans for it!!

Farm Country

Ok, so I've been posting like crazy this month. Maybe it has something to do with me starting to feel better from this pregnancy and we are actually doing things!

All week long, I thought Brian was coming home today, when in fact, he doesn't get in until tomorrow (Wednesday). Since I was a little bummed at my disappointing news, I decided to take Jackson out for a fun day to let the time pass.

We went up to Thanksgiving Point to see the Farm Country! Jackson loved it! I wanted to take him for his birthday, but it was snowing that day (yes, in may- if you remember- it snowed). The sheep and goats had their young and Jackson really liked the baby animals. He is becoming familiar with Horses now, and so he really liked seeing them, as well as the cows (but only from a distance). He would get scared if the animals tried to poke their face through the gates and try to lick him. I think he was fascinated by the chickens and ducks, and we even got to see a peacock with it's feathers on display.

The animals are really friendly and come right up to the gate to see if you have any food to give them (they let you feed the animals corn if you pay 50 cents). Jackson had the opportunity to be at the goat pen when the animals were being fed by the farmer. He gave Jackson a handful of hay to feed the animals with. Of course, Jackson doesn't like the animals coming to him, so he threw the hay on the ground and was just as excited to see the goats cluster around the food he gave them, instead of feeding out of his hand.

We also got to go for a wagon ride and he could have ridden the ponies for free, but he was scared of them too. We just settled for petting them and moving on our way.

We had a wonderful day at the farm. It was hot, but he was just happy to be running around exploring someplace new without many rules. After a refreshing lemonade and snack, we hit the road back home.

We patiently wait for Brian to come home tomorrow!
I would have taken pictures to post, but Brian has the camera. I got these off the web-site, but you get the idea.

Recipe of the week

It's been a while since I've posted a recipe. Partly because I just barely got the rangetop installed and can actually get to cooking again.

I have 2 enchilada recipes that I use often. One is creamy and the other is tomatoey (if that's a word). Tonight, I am using the creamy recipe. It's really easy to make, but full of flavor. One of my favorites. Since Brian is out of town, I'm hoping this will make enough for plenty of leftovers!
Oh, sometimes I add a little more milk to the sauce at the end...just to make sure there is plenty enough to cover the tortillas, I hate it when it dries out....

Chicken Enchiladas II

INGREDIENTS:
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 cup chopped green onions
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 (4 ounce) can diced green chiles
1 (10.75 ounce) can
condensed cream of
mushroom soup
1/2 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups cubed cooked
chicken breast meat
1 cup shredded Cheddar
cheese, divided
6 (12 inch) flour tortillas
1/4 cup milk

DIRECTIONS:
1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease a large baking dish.
2.In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter and saute the green onion until tender (about 3 to 4 minutes). Add the garlic powder, then stir in the green chiles, cream of mushroom soup and sour cream. Mix well. Reserve 3/4 of this sauce and set aside. To the remaining 1/4 of the sauce in the saucepan, add the chicken and 1/2 cup of shredded Cheddar cheese. Stir together.
3.Fill each flour tortilla with the chicken mixture and roll up. Place seam side down in the prepared baking dish.
4.In a small bowl combine the reserved 3/4 of the sauce with the milk. Spoon this mixture over the rolled tortillas and top with the remaining 1/2 cup of shredded Cheddar cheese. Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 35 minutes, or until cheese is bubbly.

More News from Brian...

I didn't get any footage yesterday, but today I made up for it! We got a little bit of a late start because we rented a car which took forever and then we got lost trying to get out of town. Finally we figured out how to get out and we drove to the dead sea; which is the lowest point on Earth. I got some good footage that I will share with you later. It was blazing hot and even the water was hot; they say the water temp can top out at 98 degrees! It was pretty cool. Then we drove safely through the West Bank all the way up to the Sea of Galilee where we visited the branch house for the only land in Israel that the church owns. We ate lunch on a pier overlooking the lake and ate fish that was caught that morning. The fish is called St. Peter's fish and is probably the same kind that they ate in the days of Christ. Every main meal we've had is also served with fresh pita bread...really yummy. Not everything has been good but at least I haven't got sick from anything.
Then we went to the Mount of the Beatitudes where Jesus taught the sermon on the Mount, and Capernaum and some other sights that I will tell you all about when I show you pictures and footage!
Once again I'm beat but I think I'm adjusted well enough to sleep well tonight and be in good shape for my meetings tomorrow and Tuesday.
This has absolutely helped strengthen my testimony and it makes we want to read the New Testament now that I have a better idea how the area is laid out...it really changes so many of my pre-conceived notions. It is teaching me a lot about the people and even the current news will make more sense after being here and having these experiences.