Slacker....

You can now officially call me the "Blog Slacker." I knew it had been awhile, but I just didn't realize HOW long until today when I noticed my last post was from August. Is it really November? I even some how managed to miss posting the big family vacation. How could I miss that? Usually I could at least say nothing has happened and that's why I haven't posted, but truly, SOO much has happened in the last few months I'm not that excited about getting caught up!

Here's my attempt though...
August: My Birthday! And it really was a good one! We met up with my brother Bryce and his wife Chelsea and ate dinner at TGI-Friday's. It was delicious and we had such a fun time chatting and catching up, especially getting in a few laughs about subbing/teaching in primary. Kids are cute :) It's so nice to have some family close, even though we don't see them near enough! P.S. Thanks for the cupcake, it was delicious!

September: We had a super fun Fluckiger family vacation to upstate New York. Highlights included

Lincoln Pond- We rode in canoes, found an island and a rope swing
Lake Placid- A cute town with a walkway all around the lake and lots of different shops
Whiteface Mountain-We took a gondola ride to the top of the mountain, it was fun to hear the nephews(mostly Ben) talk about the Gondola ride for days after, so cute!
Ausable Chasm-A must see for anyone in the area! We hiked through the chasm and past waterfalls, it was really cool and beautiful
Other Highlights- Early morning exercise classes, spending time with everyone, playing games, entertaining the nephews/niece and having some time to relax!
Thanks everyone for an awesome trip!

October:
Homework:I started school again on October 5th! It's just one class, but I only have 2 until I'm done so that gets me halfway there. Yippee! So far I've received A's on all my papers. My next class won't be until March, so I'm not that excited it's so far away, but at least I found schools that have the classes I need.

Houses:We started the house hunt again, it's a lot of work and frustrating(especially when we finally find a house we like, put in an offer and it doesn't get accepted) but we are optimistic and hopeful that we will get something soon!

Halloween: At work we dressed up as pirates, I ended up making my costume the night before-even though I tell myself every year I wont let this happen, what can I say though, it was a long week- Then Saturday morning I finished Dan's costume so we could go to the Ward trunk-or-treat. It was a fun night, with lots of little trick-or-treaters and yummy chili

The Holidays are right around the corner, so I don't think things will slow down anytime soon. In a couple weeks I head to Idaho to see my family and new nephew-everyone pray he comes on time!

(sorry...pictures to come...my computer wont upload them right now)

One more post today!

A couple Saturdays ago we were able to have lunch with my friend from high school and her husband. We had a really good time walking around downtown Seattle and eating at the Old Spaghetti Factory. Thanks for coming to lunch Whitney and Chad!



I always love getting together with friends, especially ones I haven't seen in forever!

My Favorite Snack!

Ask just about any of my old room-mates what my favorite snack is and they will probably tell you kettle corn. In college I'd get home from work and almost immediately pop a bag of kettle corn and mix up a cup of delicious chocolate milk. To this day I still can hardly get enough kettle corn. I LOVE KETTLE CORN!

Recently we bought a pop-corn popper and gigantic container of popcorn kernals, so couldn't bring ourselves to buy any microwavable kettle corn. I thought to myself, "Ok, this won't be so bad. I like freshly popped popcorn, I can do this....I can go without kettle corn!" However, tonight I COULDN'T go without it. So in desperation I searched the internet for a recipe....I thought, "Surely there must be a way to make this delicious treat from scratch." Turns out, there is! Even better, is that I like it 10X as much as the microwavable goodness.

If you like kettle corn even 1/2 as much as I do you are sure to love this!

To make:
You'll need.....
Popcorn (I used 1/2 cup unpopped kernals, Of course I popped them though!)
2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
2 Tablespoons water
2/3 cup sugar (I used white, I've heard white tastes more like kettle corn while brown tastes more like caramel corn)
salt (to taste)

First
Make sure you have popped your popcorn

Next
Combine oil,water and sugar in saucepan, bring to boil, reduce heat to medium, cook 3 minutes

Then
Pour mixture over popcorn, mix to coat and sprinkle with salt to taste!

Finally
EAT!
YUM!

HEAT-WAVE!

(FYI I started this post a few weeks ago and just now finished....so pretend it's three weeks ago when you first start reading!)
I have sooo much to get caught up on! The last month has been super busy and the last week has been super hot! For some living with temperatures in the 90's is no big deal, just part of life. For us over in Western Washington it is just plain miserable (unless you are out boating or swimming....neither of which I have been able to do). Only a lucky few are blessed with air conditioners. They've even opened up multiple "Cooling Centers" around the area where people can go to cool down, many of the centers are even offering free water and other beverages. I'll admit I kinda laughed at this when I saw it on the news, but it's actually a really good idea considering all the homeless that live in the area. I feel really blessed to have a place I can call home and escape from the major heat....even if it is small and stuffy, at least it is out of the sun!

Enough about the heat-wave though, I'll get back to what we've been up to the past month. We were delighted to be able to spend 4th of July weekend with Dan's parents. They came to visit and we had a WONDERFUL time! We spent one night in Forks,WA (The ever popular town made famous by Twilight)and were able to drive to LaPush and see the sea-stacks. It was really bautiful! Then we spent some time hiking around a few other areas and even made it as close as we could to the most northwest corner of the United States(minus Alaska), which was also very beautiful. After that it was off to Victoria,British Columbia on Vancouver Island. I LOVED this city. Tons of the buildings are Victorian style and just gorgeous. There's even a castle we were able to tour which I thought was really neat. We went to Butchart Gardens as well which is a lovely place and any gardeners dream! Most of all though, it was just good to be able to enjoy eachothers company!



Just before our trip we put an offer in on a house that we really loved, it seemed just perfect, but when we got back after the weekend we found out we'd been outbid. We were pretty disappointed but decided that maybe we would just wait a while longer and save up for a bigger down payment and a better shot at getting a house that we really like. So, it's back to renting. Which is not my favorite thing, especially since I would really like to be in a house now, but who wouldn't?

Continued.....
Since we decided to move (on the hottest day in Seattle history) I am just now finishing this post due to lack of internet.

No, we did not buy a house but we are fixing up our friends "barn" which is also the place we call home. It's not as bad as it sounds, it is really pretty nice. I especially love that we don't have to share any walls with our neighbors or the smoke they insisted on sending right through our window! In fact our closest neighbors are up the hill from us and our good friends. We are definately learning a lot and will hopefully be a step ahead when we get our own place.



We celebrated Dan's birthday (July 22) by going to Applebees (YUM!) and then had cake/cupcakes and ice-cream back at the apartment. I tried to make cute, yellow cake with boston cream filling and chocolate frosting, cupcakes...they didn't turn out as good as I'd hoped but they sure tasted good.



It seems like cupcakes are all the rage right now and I love to bake, so I see all these beautiful cupcakes other people make and then want to make them myself. So far mine haven't come out quite as good but I'll keep trying....if anyone wants to be my guinea pig let me know, I'll take any excuse to bake!

We LOVE Puerto Vallarta!

We had a wonderful time on our trip to Mexico. Weather....WONDERFUL! Hotel....AMAZING! Beach.....BEAUTIFUL! I don't think words can describe just how great it was, it really was the PERFECT vacation. Just what we needed!

We mostly just hung out on the beach drinking pina coladas(virgin of course), swam in the ocean and ate yummy food. The place we stayed at was all-inclusive and there were 5 restaurants to choose from (3 of them practically right on the beach). So we'd sit and eat a lovely meal while watching the sunset, it felt almost like a dream.

One day we went on a canopy tour where ziplined through the forest and over rivers. It was a lot of fun, then at the end their were a couple monkey cages they let us go into and feed the monkeys! They jumped right on us and ate from our hands. I was a little worried I might lose a hand, but they were so so cute!

We spent a day in downtown Puerto Vallarta at the flea market and boardwalk doing a bit of shopping and feeling some of the Mexican culture. There were sooo many shops and everywhere you turned someone was saying "come in, look, what you like?.. I have good deal!" I was worn out by the end but did have a good time. One day of that was plenty, I preferred laying on the sunny beach relaxing!

Sewing!

I finally got to work on a project while my mom was in town, well we both did, so I thought I'd share. We made a couple of baby quilts and had a really fun time. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of the other one but it was super cute with little ducks and cute fuzzy yellow squares.
I thought this might curb my yearning for being crafty......nope, now I just want to make something else!