Day 61: Hat To Be

Today I went to Lara's house and she started teaching me how to crochet these really cute hats! I'm so grateful for Lara. She has been the most wonderful friend anyone could ask for. When we moved to Ohio I had the hardest time adjusting but Lara and her husband Matt have been so kind to us. She makes you feel like you are the most special person in the whole world. I always tell Boyd I want to be just like Lara. She is so good at everything (literally everything: photography, making bread, being nice, scrap-booking, making everything look cute, and more ). I have been so blessed to know Lara and have her as a friend. I'm so sad she and her family will be moving in a few months but I'm sure grateful that I have been blessed with Lara as my friend.


It doesn't look like much now but when I finish it there will be pictures.

Day 60: The Bowl

First of all Happy March! Second I have to say I'm proud to be a Cougar! BYU Basketball is currently ranked #3! Woot! Boyd said that he is glad his two teams are in the top 3, Ohio State and BYU.

The more time I spend with Boyd's family the more I come to realize where he gets his phrases or ideas from. For example we were driving down to Carrie's in Columbus. The roads were horrible and about every 5 miles there was a car on the side of the road. Some were turned around facing the wrong direction, some were upside down, some were smashed in, but they all had one thing in common that Boyd pointed out. They were all SUVs. Boyd made a comment about how people with big cars always thing they can do what ever they want just because they have four-wheel drive. To make a long story short, we lived and made it to Carrie's. When we got there we were telling her about all the cars we saw on the side of the road and then she blurted out "that's because they were SUVs and people with four-wheel drive think they can do anything they want to!" Hum, Boyd and Carrie must be related. This brings me to my picture of the day. THE Bowl.

Boyd and I got this bowl as a wedding present. It was meant to be a popcorn bowl but the first time I mentioned I wasn't feeling well Boyd went running for this particular bowl. He told me it makes a great bowl for being sick because it is big. Anyway, anytime after that Boyd always went running for this bowl anytime I said I didn't feel well. Well, last week for the first time I actually used the bowl! You're probably wondering why I'm talking about this bowl. A few weeks ago while we were at Carrie's someone said that they weren't feeling good and the first thing that popped out of Boyd's Mom's mouth was "GRAB THE BOWL!" Ahhhh, now I know where Boyd gets it from. Thanks Mom Bills for teaching your son to grab the bowl. It has come in handy.



p.s. Bowl is a really weird word if you say it too many times.

Day 59: If I Were A Detective

This morning when I walked into the kitchen I found a very suspicious mouth shaped bite mark in our bread . . .

Considering Boyd left before me this morning and we are the only two people living in our apartment my suspect list pointed to one person.

When I started taking pictures of the bread Boyd suggested we have mice. Maybe we have giant Boyd sized mice with the same shaped mouth as him.


In case this view isn't good enough, lets look at it from a different perspective.



I'll let you be the judge.

Is Boyd guilty?

Day 58: More W. Side Market

Before all the noodles are gone I just had to take a picture. These are the BEST noodles ever! I know I always post about food, but seriously, these noodles are amazing. Today Boyd and I were laughing about how when we came home from the market the first thing the boys did was kick the girls out of the kitchen. How opposite is that! We have some pretty great husbands!

Here are the awesome spinach noodles.

Day 57: West Side Market

Cleveland is a great place to live because there are so many interesting places to visit. Today Shaun and Nicolette came over and we went up to the West Side Market! We had a BLAST! The West Side Market is an old train station that got turned into a food market. It is like stepping into a completely different world! Boyd describes it as an European style market.

This is the outside
Here is the inside


This store is special. It is a Mediterranean food store, but the people who own it are Romanian. Boyd served his mission in Romania. I love going in and seeing him interact with the people. (The way Boyd puts it "they just talk at me"). They are always a bit taken back when they find out he lived there for 2 years and can speak it. The first time we went to this store about a year ago, Boyd was asking the lady who worked there about some of the different cheeses and which one was most like Romanian cheese. She then started blabbing something to him and he started speaking back to her in Romanian. It was WEIRD! I knew my husband was talking and I knew it was his voice, but I couldn't understand him! My jaw just dropped. She asked him if he was Romanian and he had to explain to her that he just lived there for two years.

This time around Boyd tried not talking to them and just tried to go about his business, but when the owners daughter asked him something, in English, some of his Romanian accidentally popped out! He meant to say yes but "Dada" (Romanian for yes) came out instead. Boyd said the instant he said dada she knew he spoke it just because he had said it like a native. She then asked him if he could speak it and he responded with "un pic" (A little). Boyd later told me that she knew he was being modest when he said "un pic" because she started talking to him as FAST as she could! She was great! Boyd said she was really nice and was the perfect example of a young Romanian. The younger people are really friendly and just want to talk to you because you know English and Romanian. The older generation is more business oriented unless you know them. That is why Boyd was hesitant to talk to them at first. But we will most definitely be back to keep them is business and talk to their daughter.

I'm so happy that Nicolette and Shaun could come with us! We had a grand ol' time.


My favorite quote from today was when we first stepped into the market and Shaun's face lit up like a kid in a candy shop! He was just so enamored with everything that was going on around him. He turned to us and said "Do you see how big my smile is right now?!?!"
Honestly, this trip was so much fun and the reason why it was so much fun was the fact that Shaun was beaming the whole time and just so excited about everything.


On our way to the West Side Market we saw these weird metal statues on the side of the road. I just had to get a picture of them on our way back. Boyd said that he is holding a truck. I still don't know what he is holding or doing. Anyway, there is a bunch of crazy cool architecture in Cleveland that I'm really excited to capture sometime in the future.

Day 56: Orange?

Yay for snow days! It is an answer to my prayers, literally! I'm sick of being sick. Today, there was a giant blizzard and I didn't have to go to work. Hurray! I am feeling better, which is good and I was actually able to blog today!

I think my husband might be playing too much wii. For those who haven't played wii sports resort there is a game called speed slice slice and dice. There are falling objects and you must slice the object before your opponent. While I was sick, I caught Boyd throwing an orange up in the air and he some how managed to slice it perfectly in half! I later found this orange sitting on our kitchen counter. It has been there for a few days. Boyd must really be proud of it!


p.s. I love oranges! I was sad when we moved to Ohio because all the oranges were gross. However Costco saves the day again! They have amazing oranges and we have already gone through a 13 lb box of oranges. Yum!

Day 55: Feeling like blaah.

Allison is still sick. She took this picture while lying on the couch and said, "I got your reflection." Prior to this I was messing around with the camera's ISO feature by taking picture of her in her pitiful state on the couch. She didn't want those ones on the internet, but I got some good color in a poorly lit room.

Day 54: Food Poisoning Strikes Again.

Staph Aureus strikes again. The world has a whole new perspective when you're taking a clinical microbiology course. Every sniffle, semi-sore throat, or loose stool, and you're wondering what could it be? My lab group and I tried to puzzle out an unknown bacteria this past week. Made a streak plate, took a gram stain. (I wish I could have taken a picture of the beautiful gram stain that I took.) At this stage it's probably moraxella catarrhalis. It causes respiratory infections, no big deal, right. As fun as playing with pathogenic bacteria is, I've decided that I would rather take microbiology as a faith based course. Tell me that it exists and I'll believe you. I don't need to see it for myself.
Anyway.
Allison went out to eat today and caught a nasty bug in her tummy. While Allison is puking her guts out in the bathroom, I am posting for her. Since, she hasn't felt good all day, she didn't get a picture in, so I dug through the archives and found this gem.

Day 53: Gobble Gobble

Yay, our first turkey! You can tell when food is on sale because we end up buying things like 16 lbs of ground beef or a 18 lb turkey. . . It had been sitting in our freezer for the past few months haunting us and taking up way too much space. So two Sundays ago Boyd and I decided to cook our first turkey!

The poor thing had been trying to be such a good turkey and be completely defrosted before we cooked it, however, it still had to take a nice warm bath before it was defrosted.


Then Boyd skewered it.I said it looked like it was going in for surgery with all that metal hanging out from it.




It was so good I forgot to take after pictures. But you get a peek at the yummy crispy skin!


Then it was back in the freezer for the turkey! Only now it is in pieces and we get to eat things like spanish turkey (instead of spanish chicken), turkey dumpling soup, turkey sandwiches, and everything turkey you can think of! Yum!

Day 52: Buurrrrr

Snow, Snow Go Away
Don't Come Back, You Skies Of Gray
Boyd & Allison Want To Play
Sun, Sun Come My Way

How does the weather go from sunny 56 degrees to 26 feels like 10 . . .
Buuurrr. I'm ready for winter to be over.
Just outside our apartment even the trees are saying it's cold because they are completely frozen over. One time we went to visit Grandma Bills and somebody asked if it was spring yet. She then proceeded to walk over to a tree and snap off a branch. "Well it's spring according to the tree" she said. Well, according to our trees, it is still winter!








Now, I'm not sure what these spiky balls are. I always see them on the ground and occasionally trip on them. Boyd said when he was a kid he and his friends would throw the spiky balls at each other. Ouch.


Ironically, after I originally posted this, Boyd came running in from school with a frozen branch in his hand and told me that this is what an ice storm looks like. Hum, we must think alike!