My surgery

...I waited about an hour in pre-op and Eric came in to be with me for the 30 minutes or so before they wheeled me into the OR. I had some good times with the Nurses and Anesthesiologist. I kiddingly asked if I'd get stickers or a balloon, preferably yellow, for being a good patient. Next thing I knew, one of the Nurses came back with 4, yes 4, stickers and another Nurse came back with a yellow balloon! How cool was that?! haha

So..... the surgery went well and my Dr. made only one incision-comin' right out of my belly button. I am indeed grateful that she (my Dr.) was able to diagnose and treat me. For those of you that care, I'm feeling a million times better since my surgery and the pain is not as constant and occasionally, almost nonexistent. Woot woot!! My recovery from the surgery was far from smooth. Thank goodness for Eric, our Bishop, and the sweet people that brought us dinner and took care of me while Eric was at work. (Thank you, thank you!)

White Chocolate Cheesecake recipe

The recipe is from foodnetwork.com. I'm a giant fan of the Food Network Channel! Uh hem.. Now, with this recipe, you can use just about any kind of fruit. At least, I'd imagine you could. The first time I made it I used fresh raspberries. This time around, as you can see by the pictures, I used fresh strawberries and blueberries. Both were quite delectable. Here's the recipe according to the food network and with my added input...

Crust:

1 cup slivered almonds (I don't use almonds, ps)

2 cups graham cracker crumbs (one indiv. pkg graham crackers will suffice)

1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter, melted (I just eye-ball it and typically use about 2-ish spoonfuls)

Filling:

8 ounces fine-quality white chocolate (Nestle will do just fine)

4 (8 oz) packages cream cheese, softened (you definitely want it softened-it makes it so much easier to mix)

1/2 cup + 2 Tbsp. sugar

4 whole large eggs (whatever eggs you buy works wonderfully)

2 large egg yolks

2 Tbsp. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. vanilla

2 cups fresh raspberries (11 ounces) (I've never measured the fruit, but one-two boxes of raspberries, one box of blueberries and one box of strawberries are the 'measurements' that I've used)

Garnish: Fresh raspberries, mint sprigs and raspberry coulis (the added fruit + mint leaves makes it look real nice)

Make crust: Finely grind almonds and crumbs in a food processor and add butter, blending until combined. Press over bottom and 2/3 up side of a 10-inch springform pan. (I used the Pampered Chef food chopper this last time and have used a freezer size ziploc bag to crush the graham crackers. Also, if you don't have a springform pan, a glass Pyrex dish works just as well-just keep an eye on it as it gets closer to the 55 minute mark)

Make filling: Preheat oven to 350*

Melt chocolate in a double boiler or a large metal bowl set over a saucepan of barely simmering water, stirring until smooth, and remove from heat.

Beat cream cheese with an electric mixer (or by hand) at medium speed until fluffy, then beat in sugar. Add whole eggs and yolks, 1 at a time (yes, 1 at a time), beating well at low speed and scraping down bowl after each addition.

Beat in flour and vanilla until just combined, then add melted chocolate in a slow stream, beating until filling is well combined.

Arrange berries in 1 layer over crust and pour filling into crust. (I threw in an extra layer of berries after the first layer of cream cheese mixture, instead of pouring it in the pan all at once. My strawberries baked right into the crust which wasn't what I was hoping, but it doesn't do that with raspberries-just make it your own) Bake in middle of oven until cake is set 3 inches from edge but center is still wobbly when pan is gently shaken, 45-55 minutes.

Run a knife around edge of cake to loosen (if in a springform pan), then cool completely in pan on a rack (or counter) Cake will continue to set as it cools. Serve at room temperature or chilled (I prefer chilled).

Cooks' note: Cheesecake can be made 3 days ahead and chilled, covered.

Our Elliptical

Our latest purchase.. other than groceries of course ;) We bought it about a month ago and it arrived the week of my surgery.. We've actually been pretty good about getting on it regularly. I do it 3-5 times a week, carefully of course (mom) and the same with Eric, when I 'push' him to do it, that is. JK. I told him that if we bought this, we'd really have to be committed to working out on it and not just have it sit there.. so far so good.

Balloons!

We bought some wood to put under our elliptical -oh right, I haven't posted about that yet..next post-and when we got home, Eric thought it'd be fun to see if the balloons would hold me. We put 12 balloons under the wood and amazingly, not a single one popped!
Thank goodness I'm on ballons and not water. I bet I'd be off the 'board before I could even stand up.
They stuck to the wood afterwards! Well, all but 2.

Here are the videos we took of Eric and I on the balloons.

Eric's Birthday take 2

We'd invited the senior Missionaries to join us for cheesecake and despite having eaten 2/3 of the cheesecake that night, it took Eric and I another 3-4 days to finish it up.
"Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you..."
The senior Sisters gave us a crawfish paper holder, so fun, for our birthday and the Matsons gave us stinkin' cute alligator salt and pepper shakers.
Notice the difference between where Eric's head is (though he is slightly on his toes) and where my head is.. the Sisters thought it'd be funny to have our pictures taken 'in' the streamers.

Eric's Birthday!!

After Eric left for work, my day started with making his favorite dessert, cheesecake. Thanks to Pampered Chef and my amazing baking skills, ha, I set out to make the most delicious dessert ever! I decided to make white chocolate strawberry and blueberry cheesecake. It's not exactly the the quickest dessert to make, but heck, it was 6 in the morning, what else was I going to do?! lol

The finished product!

Can I just say that it was the best cheesecake ever!! Okay, so I'm a little biased, but it really was quite wonderful tasting!!
I decorated the apartment before Eric came home... blowing up the balloons was the hardest part for me.. well, that and having to climb on a chair to tape up the streamers. Yeah for being a shorty.

The chef, and I use the term oh so loosely, and her work.. I'm pretty sure that it was the coolest apron in the world that helped make the food turn out so well :) Thank you parents!
One of Eric's favorite dinners.. homemade chicken strips!

Opening his birthday gifts....
I wrapped his shoes so that he could open them on his actual birthday, instead of on mine..
Eric looks quite confused, and was really, at how this gift work. Debra, his mom, had bought him Pringles and taped money to it, then wrapped ribbon around the whole container.

June events

Eric and I decided to "camp out" in our apartment, so we blew up our air mattress (is that cheating??), built a fort and slept in it one night and took a nap in it the next. Fun times for sure!

It's my birthday!! (was, my birthday) Eric arrived home before I did as I was running some errands and got caught up at the store. It worked out perfectly though because he was able to decorate the apartment before I got home. I love balloons!!
Eric (and I, but I give him all the glory) made homemade ham and broccoli quiche for my birthday dinner. It was SO good!!
I had ordered one of Eric's gifts and it arrived on my birthday. Eric picked up the package to move it and immediately said, "It's shoes!" So there went my surprise. Since he guessed what it was, I let him open it up before I opened my gifts. It was definitely worth it to see the huge grin on his face when he saw what kind of shoes they were..
They're a perfect fit!
Again, I love balloons-of all kinds!! I guess I'm still a kid at heart.
My mother used to make me a bunny cake every year for my birthday growing up, so we continued the tradition. Eric was originally going to make a cake from scratch with colored dye and all.. long story short, that didn't end up working out, so I ran to the store to buy frosting and cake mix and made the cake. The pink in the ears was Eric's idea. Too cute.
We invited the senior Sisters to come over to eat cake with us. Funny story though. I left the apartment to run to the store and when I got to the car, the Sisters were just pulling up. I went over to them and asked them if they wanted to come over in a few hours to eat cake with us. (They'd just recently asked us when our birthdays were...) They said sure and when they arrived, they were very surprised at all the balloons in our apartment. They were like, 'oh balloons! Why are there, what are we cele', Oh! goodness! We forgot! Happy birthday, Amy!'... So pretty much you had to be there, but what's even more funny is that they came with a plate of cookies.. for ERIC!! haha. Their expressions were priceless and still makes us laugh.

Ps, most of the pictures that were taken that night didn't turn out well, so you get only one to look at! Sorry.

Playing Catch Up!

May: Eric and I decided to go on a bike ride at a nearby park one Saturday. We noticed that there was a cement trail and so we thought we'd check it out. The bike ride turned more into a very low key mountain biking adventure. It'd rained the previous day and Eric, being a guy, rode through every puddle he possibly could. It definitely was a new adventure for me as I'd never been mountain biking before or even anything close to it. After riding through the trees on a tiny trail, we decided to call it quits and head home. But then Eric spotted a big pile of dirt and thought it'd be fun to jump it. He rode it a few times and as I was about to go next, he cautioned me to make sure I got enough speed and went up the right "track" that he had made. I asked him to go one more to so that I could see where he meant... he straight biffed it! I saw him go up the side of the dirt pile but I didn't see him land and ride off like before. I rode towards him and just as I got there, he was getting up from off the ground. I laughed so hard! Oh, good times. The orange color on his shirt, arm, and leg is from him falling. The mud is from all the puddles he rode through.

April: The first time Eric and I had driven down to check out New Orleans. This large crawfish was outside of the restaurant we ate at.
May: The pictures below are from our Crawfish Boil that our ward put on. It was mine and Eric's first time eating crawfish. It's definitely a messy food. The crawfish are served to you whole and you have to rip it apart in order to get to the meat inside the tail. First, twist and tear of the head. Next, grap the tail and squeeze it so that the top of it breaks and then peel of the hard shell of the crawfish and voila! you have successfully found crawfish 'meat'. Now the meat itself is unbelievably small. In a good sized crawfish, it's about the size of half of your thumb (smaller if you're male). I told Eric that I was okay with never eating crawfish again unless I absolutely had to.

You can see by my expression that I wasn't thrilled to be trying crawfish, but I might as well have tried it sooner rather than later, right? The flavor really wasn't bad and the texture is similar to that of shrimp. It's more the concept that I was kind of turned off by. I mean, they're whole when they're served to you for crying out loud!

One of our favorite senior Sister Missionaries, Sister Dustin. She's a hoot! She's loud and outspoken and so much fun to be around.
This is Sister Goodin, her companion. She's more on the quiet side and so sweet. We always have fun when we spend time with these ladies. They're like our grandmas out here.
Sister Matson (no, Grandma, you guys aren't related at all), another senior missionary, and her husband are two more people that we love here. The two companionships live in our apartment complex in addition to one more senior couple. They're all so nice and we enjoy spending time with them.