Infinite Power of Hope

Infinite Power of Hope

Ahhhh, It's like music to my ears, that sweet sound of ....clinking kits as I sterilize them????

Well I can definitely tell you that when I left for school last September I thought that I wasn't going to be back working for nine months.... but as it turns out I am working a little sooner that I had expected, for the time expected to have off. My body is not used to the 6 am wake up time either, but it will be whipped into shape soon!! I am very excited to say that I remember almost everything that I was doing though, in both the Record and sterilizing department. I can walk through X-rays as if I were sleep walking and drawer stocking is like second nature to me!
But honestly my very first morning when I started prepping for the Day and I moved the Kits around and they started clinking I smiled inside myself and realized how much I tuned out that noise by the end of last summer. It's really the little things that we take for granted, isn't it? Not that the kit noise is anything super exciting or meaningful to me, I just realized it's the little things that we remember, that make the difference.

Memorable Quote of the Day:
I like 'em black, just like my men. -One of the Ladies I work with talking about the sunglasses she prefers in her drawer.

My online classes are going okay, you know same ole same ole. I am taking an English Class and Nutrition online.

Culinary Front:
I haven't made anything new in the last couple of days, but we've planned out our meals for the week so we don't eat spur of the moment things.

I really want to be more healthy. I've gained 15 lbs since the beginning of last year and I'm not sure that my pants could take another jump like that this year. HAHA. So I've decided that I want to do better, with exercising, yoga, being more active (in everything), eating healthier (thank you Culinary Nutrition for your edu-ma-cation). You name it, I probably want to be better at it! I do know that my family and I are thinking of running in a 5K coming up here next month so that is exciting!

Craft Corner:
I also haven't made very much progress here. I did send out the Curtains to Kami and David and she told me today that she loved them, and I hope to be getting some pictures soon. I also have researched a ton into the new die-cutting machines including the Cricut Expression, which I think is what I have decided on. Now I just need to buy it! Also I bought the hinges to fix my hope chest and all of the supplies to make my earring and necklace holder, which I hope to do this weekend. What can I say? I have projects coming out of the Wazoo! But I'm working through them!

This is my brother and I.

See, Hear, Speak No Evil!

And now I am going to go read my homework until I fall asleep, which I hope is soon!

Once again I hope that those of you who made New Years Goals will keep them (and help me keep mine!), those of you who haven't yet, to make them, and that we can remember the little things are the most important things of life.

And these are the Musings of a Twenty-year old Something.

You Spin My Head Right Round, Right Round!

I have been meaning to Blog for quite some time now. For a quick catch up I'll do a quick little blog log.

Blog Log

• I turned 21 on Dec. 5! Yesss I'm finally legal! And i'm so thankful to all of my friends who came to my little get-to-gether, who I hadn't seen in quite a while.


• Finals week (which for me was the last three weeks of school) was Busy! What with schoolwork and projects, then friends and callings. I have never had a busier semester overall, but also I have never had to grow so much and experience so much! It was craziness! But I also am very proud to report some very good grades that I gleaned from my labors.


• The power outage was such a crazy night what with packing and pizza and helping others with homework (or more distracting, that is). But my oh my that pizza was delicious! My roommate Chrissy and I left the town in darkness in search of the first pizza parlor that we could come across that was open and had power and still had pizza. What then ensued you ask? ....Well, we then passed several open parlors and went way out of our way to the Little Ceasers in IF. What an adventure it was and I hope ne'er again to see the shady man with a mullet. (I mean seriously the mullet went out of fashion 30 years ago. It's dead. Let it die.)


• Then in a crazy whirlwind of events my parents came helped load up my stuff, finish off my clean check, go to dinner, and then get out of dodge ...after the people in the hotel room next to us kept us up most the night with a terrible fight.


• And now I am home.


• Home for a whole nine months. Working. At Molen Orthodontics again, which I am very glad to have my job back, btw.


• I did have a surgery, another gum graft as it were, on the 28 of December. Thought it failed, but found out today it didn't! Which means I may have come to the end of the road with all of my oral difficulties! Which is very exciting~ At least to me, and my family. But lets not count the chickens before they hatch!


• So what now to expect?

I surmise that the next few months may be a little lonely as compared with the previous two winters, but with good purpose. I will fill the bank only to return again triumphant! (of what I am still figuring...)

I have many projects I have finished, am working on or, hope to have underway soon! And Iwill update you as they come! Recently I have just finished a matching Curtain set to go with the bedsest that I made for David and Kami Summers. And hope to get some pictures up soon.

On the Culinary Front, I have not made very much because I have had a pretty serious cold for about two weeks now. BUT something good I have made but do not have pictures of is my Grilled Cheese Dippers with Spicy Tomato-Cheese Soup. Now you can easily make this not very spicy at all, or add more spicy-ness to your taste, (for example, if you were my roommate Jayme.)

Pic. (Unavaliable, just picture a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup. Original I know!)

Recipe

Dippers: 1 can Fiesta Style Chedder Southwest Soup (if unavaliable try Southweset Style Pepper Jack soup or something similiar) - 8 oz shredded Mexican Cheese Blend - 1 Baguette French Bread, sliced 1/2 " thick (now you don't need the French Bread, but it's delicious) - Butter

Soup: 1 can Tomato Soup - 1 can Cheddar Cheese Soup - 3 c Spicy Vegetable Juice - 2 tsp Hot Pepper Sauce - 1 tsp dried Basil

Mix the Fiesta Style Chedder Southwest soup with the Mexican Cheese Blend and spread across the buttered bread and cook as you would a grilled cheese sandwich. While making the sandwiches, mix the soup ingredients together and when both are heated serve together!

Very delicious! Be careful not to add too much cheese though it will make a sticky mess of your sandwiches!

I hope that those of you who made New Years goals, keep them, those of you who haven't yet, to make them, and that we all may keep our heads about ourselves, as life keeps spinning us around and around and around!

Vampires, Food, and Football

During the weekend of the 13-15 of November, I went down to Salt Lake for Time Out for Women. It was a wonderful weekend. I was able to spend time with almost all of the women on the Gorringe side of my family. Mom, Aunts, Cousins, Cousin-in-Laws; the whole she-bang. We had such a good time with so many different speakers. I committed while I was there that I wanted to share the message that we gathered. We had speakers such as Wendy Watson Neilson, Sheri Dew, Mary Ellen Edmunds, Hilary Weeks, S. Micheal Wilcox, Emily Watts, and Kris Belcher. It was a spiritually high weekend! On my return drive on Sunday I decided I need to stop and check my tires and use the restroom, the first place I came across was a small town exit of Virgina, Idaho. I pulled off the road and the first and what looked like only building was a church building. An LDS church building. ;) I pulled in the parking lot. Check my tires real quick and then went inside, hoping I wouldn't come across anyone who would think I was a suspicious character. When I walked in that small building I heard Primary children singing songs. A man teaching what sounded like a Sunday School lesson. At that moment, I was so thankful for the Church's that we have all over the world.

Thoughts From TOFW

• When a Righteous Woman says, "There is something not quite right here, there is something very wrong." -Wendy Watson Neilson of her abduction
• The Liberty Jail, a horrible memory, a horrible place of darkness in Church History was filled with light and made into a prison temple with all of the Revelations that were received there by the Prophet Joseph Smith. In the most miserable experiences of our lives, they can become moments of light and knowledge to us.
• Live by the words: Not Even Once.
• 2 Nephi 25:26
• Society is made up of families, and when families collapse, so do societies, and when societies collapse so do countries.
• Sometimes we act like we're going to stay here, but we aren't, we can't and we won't. -Elder Holland
• Three Things that the Adversary tries to get us with: 1. Confused about who we are. 2. Keep us from understanding what the Savior did for us and what he will do for us. 3. Keep us from receiving personal revelation. Things we need to keep in mind. 1. We have always been a child of God. Not just now. We're here and were on assignment. The lord wouldn't send us here at this time if we couldn't handle it. Abraham 3:22-23. 2. He didn't just make it possible for us to repent, he made it possible to heal us. 3. Our degree of purify is a prerequisite to feeling the spirit and having it's guidance in our lives. "Receiving Revelation" Richard G. Scott 2009 General Conference.
• It will not always be easy to stand for truth and righteousness, but we will not forgive ourselves if we don't do it.
• Our Life-Assurance Policy is the Great Plan of Happification.
• The scriptures are the handbook for Life Assurance.
• Sweet Assurance- The certainty that comes when you know life's truths.
• At night I turn all of my problems unto God. He is going to be up all night anyways.
• Sweet Assurance is knowing that God is truly with us.
• Sometimes it's the trial of our life who make us who we have to be; who the Lord needs us to be.
• We do all that we can to get the fruit, we water the seed, we feed the seed, we shelter it from storms, but there is something that we cannot control and that is the sun. The son blesses the seed and helps it grow in a way that nothing else can.
• Heavenly Father won't give us anything we can't handle by ourselves.

I know if you know me you're asking "What is that poster doing on her Blog?" One very easy answer. When I came home for Thanksgiving Break my family, my friend Brandan, and I all went to this movie. I'm not going to waste time and space by venting my Twilight thoughts and feelings, but let me just say this. I enjoyed this movie a lot better then the first one (at least up until the point when Edward came back on the screen), I did laugh a lot, but this movie did make me at least want to finish reading the series. I can also tell you that I am most definitely Team Jacob -in the movies at least-.

This is a picture that my brother and I took at Fred Meyer's after we had watched the movie. Love it! He's the best and I miss him already even though my flight leaves in like 15 hours.

This was our Thanksgiving Feast! It was delicious! We had a family in our ward, The Roberts, come and eat with us. It was so much fun to have them all and then we played the game Ticket to Ride. I definitely recommend it!

These are the Elders that are serving in our Ward, the one next to my dad, Elder Gerun is going home on the 30th of November. They are good friends with my family and have helped them a lot with the additions that we are doing on our house. After dinner and the game we went to the movie, The Blind Side and it was a very moving awesome movie! I was so moved and want to someday have that effect in someones life. I'm am so thankful for the opportunity I had to come home for the Thanksgiving season to spend it with my family. There would have been nothing better or more worthwhile for me to do. Hoping that all of your warmest wishes come true...

Food, Food, Food Forever!

With the Salsa and Guacamole that I had made the night before, the next day I then made my special Burrito Dish. You just take frozen burritos and line them in a baking dish (approximate 1 burrito for 1 person) then on top of them you pour two cans of Chili; one can of black beans, drained; 1/2 can of refried beans; 1/2 a carton of Sour Cream; Salsa; Guacamole; and shredded cheese. We cooked it at the temperature it says on the package for the time it denotes for frozen burritos and served it with tortilla chips that we had cut strips from tortilla shells. We put the oven on broil and then placed the strips in the oven for a couple of minutes at a time on each side, watching them as they cooked. It was a delicious meal and everyone loved it! For dessert we fryed more tortilla shells and sprinkled cinnamon sugar on them with ice cream and chocolate syrup. It was delicious. And a perfect meal for a fun get together!

Then one day we made pizza together. It's a very good dough recipe that I got from a cookbook my friend got for me.

Homemade Pizza Crust

1 tsp (1 pkg) Yeast ~ 1 c Warm Water ~ 1 tsp Sugar ~ 2 c Flour ~ 1 tsp Italian Seasoning ~ 1 tsp Salt ~ 1 tbsp Butter ~ 1 tbsp Cornmeal ~ Marinara Sauce ~ Pizza Toppings ~ Shredded Mozzarella (Provolone ot other similar cheese are very very good!)

Dissolve the yeast and sugar in the warm water. Put the flour, italian seasonings, salt, butter, and yeast mixer in a large bowl and mix until combined being careful not to overmix. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let the dough rise in a warm place for about 15 minutes. Sprinkle a pizza stone or a cookie sheet with cornmeal and stretch or roll dough to fit. Bake in a 475 degree oven until golden brown. Take out of oven and spread with marinara sauce, toppings, and cheese, then bake in oven until the cheese is melted.

I like to double this recipe and it makes just about enough for 6 people. Just be careful to add the butter, once I made it and forgot to add it, and it turned out okay, but the crust was really hard.

Last Sunday we made Breaded Chicken Parmesan in the slow cooker, while we went to church. We also had some Rhodes rolls which we let defrost and rise while we were at church. Talk about delicious! The parmesan was a little salty so I might lower the sodium level just a little bit.

Chicken Parmesan with Penne Pasta

1 egg ~ 1/3 c plain bread crumbs ~ 1/3 shredded Parmesan cheese ~ 1/2 tsp Italian seasoning ~ 1/4 tsp salt ~ 1/4 tsp pepper ~ 4 boneless skinless chicken breasts ~ 1 jar tomato pasta sauce ~ 1/2 c shredded Italian cheese blend ~ 2 2/3 c uncooked penne pasta

Spray 2 to 3 quart slow cooker with cooking spray. In a small shallow bowl, beat egg until foamy. In separate shallow bowl, mix bread crumbs, parmesan cheese, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper. Dip chicken into egg, then coat evenly with bread crumbs mixture; place in cooker. Spread pasta sauce evenly over chicken. Cover; cook on Low heat setting 5 to 6 hours. Sprinkle Italian cheese blend over top. Cover; cook on Low heat setting for 10 more minutes. Meanwhile cook and drain the pasta. Serve pasta with chicken. Enjoy!

Food Food and more Food!

With so many things to blog about and so little time i might do this in more then one session. I have been incredibly busy with midterms and projecs and just life in general! I will first discuss my recipes that I've made recently and then next the activities we have been about recently.

Well a while ago now I made a meatball soup (homemade meatballs and all) which I can't really give you the recipe for because I make up my soup recipes on the spot. But it was very delicious, the only thing that I saw that needed improvement was the amount of broth, this of course would be easier to have more broth if I had a bigger pot, but for now I'll have to deal with what I have. Over all there was chicken stock, noodles, stewed tomatoes, black beans, celery, onions, italian seasonings, carrots, and meatballs of course.

I then also made some homemade Salsa and Guacamole, which both are delicious by the way! I made them the night before we had our neigbors over for dinner, so we would have less things to do the next day.

Blender Salsa

6 Roma Tomatoes ~ 2 Jalapeno Peppers ~ 1 Green or Red Bell Pepper ~ 1/2 c fresh Cilantro ~ 1 clove Garlic ~ 1 c Onion ~ 1 tsp Salt

Coarsely chop the tomatoes and peppers. In a sauce pan simmer the tomatoes and peppers until soft and tender, then pour into the blender. Add the chopped cilanto and minced garlic, onion, and salt to the blender. Pulse until salsa reaches desired consistency. Very good served both right out of the blender or chilled.

Chuncky Guacamole with Tomato

Makes about 2 1/2 cups.

2 ripe Avacado's ~ 3 tbsp finely chopped yellow onion ~ 1 Jalapeno Pepper, minced~ 1 tbsp chopped fresh Cilantro ~ 1 tbsp Lime Juice ~ 1 clove garlic, minced ~ 1 large Tomato ~ Salt-to taste

Combine the coarsely chopped avacado's, onion, pepper, cilantro, lime juice and garlic. Mash with a fork until the avacado is chuncky but not smooth. Stir in the diced tomato and season with salt. Cover and keep refridgerated until ready to serve.

Recipes, Roommates and Showers

^Previous Recipe^
Individual Chocolate Lava Cakes

CHOCOLATE CENTERS
1/2 bar Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet baking bar
1/4 c heavy cream

CAKE
Nonstick cooking spray
1 bar Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet baking bar
1/2 c unsalted butter
2 eggs
2 egg yolks
1/3 c sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 c cake flour

Fruit and Whipped Cream Garnish (Raspberries or Strawberries are good)

First you melt the 1/2 baking bar and cream in a double boiler (a pot filled with water and metal bowl works just fine too!) Whisk the mixture gently to blend. Refrigerate about 2 hours or until firm. Then roll into balls, about an inch wide keep refrigerated until needed.
To make the cake you: heat the oven to 400 degrees. Then spray down 6 ramekins or custard cups (I actually used a muffin pan and it made 11 perfectly sized and proportioned lava cakes) with the cooking spray. Melt the remaining chocolate and butter in a double boiler and whisk to blend. Place eggs, yolks, sugar, and vanilla in a mixer bowl. Mix together medium speed for about 5 minutes or until thick and light. Then fold in the melted chocolate mixture and flour by hand until just combined. Then divide between the prepared molds and in the middle of the batter pouring, place a chocolate ball. Bake for about fifteen minutes, or until the cake is firm to the touch. Let it sit in the oven for about 5 minutes, run a knife around the edge of the mini cakes, and then invert upon a plate. Drizzle with chocolate sauce, whipped cream and I fanned strawberries.
^Previous Recipe^

Today I was so lucky to go to my old roommates bridal shower. Kelli and Robbie are going to get married on October 23, 2009. We were so excited to have seen the fruition of their relationship, and wish them all of the luck in the world as their two lives become one! Of all thirteen roommates that I've had 7 of them are now married (yes Kami you are included as a roommate). I just have to say I love married people. :)

The other picture is of my recent haircut.

Today I gave out to Kelli and also whipped up a batch of my famous cookies. I'm still debating on whether I am going to give out that coveted recipe online or not. I'll let you know when the deliberation is over.

I've recently discovered the Artist Owl City, and their song Fireflies. I'm in love with it. I highly recommend them.

I've recently happened upon a definition I love for peace:

Peace is that all is well with that which matters most.

And finally good luck with all of your endeavors whether they be great or small.