Fall Wreath

So every year I make a Thanksgiving/Fall wreath. What I usually do is just gather fall leaves and flowers from around our house and try to arrange them on a wreath I have made of grape vines. Every year my creation is beautiful. For 10 minutes. Then any attempt to fix this natural arrangement ended in an over glued and ribbon tied mess that shriveled on day two.

Therefore, I decided to get over my hatred of fake flowers and make a durable, well thought-out fall decoration.

I went to the local craft store and spent way too long looking over all the fake flower choices. Overwhelming amount of choices...all fake looking. I finally took my most natural looking ones and passed the wooden letters. For some reason I could not resist. Monograms are so clique but I just couldn't say no.

After buying my fake flowers, I walked out to my car to find a nice batch of dried wheat growing right in the parking lot planters. Also could not resist (I am not sure the fake dried wheat sales were going so well with their choice of parking lot plants). Then driving home I saw a maple tree with the greatest red leaves and then some great bushes with berries and then...well you get the idea. Thus was born the fake/natural wreath.

I actually really like the way it turned out and it was really simple to make.

I just pushed the fake leaves in the spaces in the vines.

Tied the wheat together and weaved it in the vines.

Make a cloth 'ribbon' out of old scraps and super glued some lace on.

Then hung the "E" on the ribbon.

If you already have a grapevine wreath then the cost is about $5 for the rest.

I also stained the "E" so that it was a little better match with the rest.

Then I just hung it up with a simple nail in the wall.

The wreath is still intact today and it was rather windy. So I decided the design is ready to share:)

Very Possible Impossible Coconut Pie

So this pie is called impossible pie...I think they are going for irony or something because it is the easiest ever!

Here is my gluten free version:

2 eggs, beaten
1 c. organic sugar
3 T. melted butter
1 tsp vanilla
1 c. milk
31/2 T. gluten free flour mix

1/2 T. baking powder
3 ½ oz flaked coconut

Mix flour with baking powder first. Pour into 9-in buttered glass pie plate. Bake at 350 for 30 min. Makes its own crust.

Yummy!

Pocket Quiches

The hot summer night is killing me! So I am thinking of cooler times and the things I use to use my hot oven for. These delightful nums popped into my head.

These are perfect for a great dinner and then an easy breakfast in the morning.

Pocket Quiche Lorraine

Make Crust:

• 2 cups oat flour (save money! buy bulk oats and stick them in the food processor)
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1/3 cup milk

1. Mix together and roll to 1/4 thick.

2. Use a pizza cutter to cut into squares comparable to muffin tin size.

3. Place squares into muffin tin (you do not need a square muffin tin to make this work).

Make Filling:

• 6 eggs
• 1/4 cup cheddar cheese (or cheese of choice)
• 1/4 cup milk

1.Beat eggs.

2. Add milk and cheese.

3. Pour mixture into each tin.

Bake:

1. Bake at 400 for 5 minutes.

2. Turn oven down to 350 and bake for 10 minutes.

3. Check quiches until they are puffed and slightly brown on the surface (also if you stick a knife in one and it comes out dry then you know you are done)

Enjoy your pocket full!

No-Bake Naner Ice-cream Sandwiches.

Now, take your naner ice-cream and smash it between some more deliciousness.
When my sister-in-laws and I made this it didn't turn out just like an ice-cream sandwich as far as flavor, but it was still yummy!

1 cup oat flour
1/4 cup coco powder
1/2 cup raisins
1/3 cup agave sweeter (or a sweetner of your choice)
3 T water

1. Stick the raisins in a food processor until they turn mushy and then add the water and whir some more until pasty.
2. Add the sweetner.
3. Add the oat flour and coco powder (add less coco powder if you like it less dark)
Roll dough to 1/2 inch thick and cut out with cookie cutters.
Then take cookie cutter and place over once cookie side. Fill with ice-cream and smooth off and then put the top of the cookie in place. Slide off the cookie cutter!
Stick in freezer when done.

The Wedding

Our wedding was such a special day. The weather, the venue, the time of day, the food was perfect. We had the wedding party come down early so we went rafting one day and then had to prepare the rest of the time. It was amazing to have all our family and friends send us off at the end of the day. The best way to start our life together:)

BTW: The kiss at the alter was both of ours very first! Ask me more about how we did it and why.

Engagement

I am going to jump ahead a bit just because I am anxious to be up to speed with this blog (I don't know why because all I really want to say is what we ate for dinner or other very interesting things).
Finals week of spring term, Zeph said he had planned a date for an end of the school year. I didn't suspect anything because I was still thinking he had not asked my dad. We went out to dinner at a cute pub downtown. I had just decided I needed a new picture of the two of us so I kept taking photos. Then we drove out to a wildlife reserve. We wondered around as I was taking pictures of the beautiful pictures. Zeph was marching toward a broken over tree out in the field of flowers. We got out to the tree and he turned promptly around and heads back through the field. I contently followed him back to a bench. And he sat down. I followed thinking it was one of his "lets sit and enjoy life" moments. He seemed really impatient though as he was twitching his knee up and down. He asked me what I was thinking and I said that I was just in awe of the beauty got had made and how he had put it together. He then turned and said how he was amazed at how God had put us together. He knelt and I was already saying yes. He asked and opened the box...and the ring fell out. He scrambled and caught it before it went between the cracks of the walkway we were on. We laughed and he put the ring on. We enjoyed the rest of the beautiful sunset, super happy.

The Road Trip to No Where

Safe in the hotel.

Note the missing steering wheel.

You can see the fire extinguisher shooting out.

One of the truck drivers.

I was thinking of things that have happened to Zeph and I over the two years before we entered a live together in marriage. One event stuck out in my mind and I decided to put it up in the journal.
A couple of winters ago a group of our friends at Oregon State University and we decided to go on a road trip to the Grand Canyon over Christmas break. Our friend Craig borrowed his parents Honda Passport. we named it Rosa and loaded it to the max with our stuff. We even had one person in the back hatch area and a car top carrier. The beginning of the trip started slow as there had been freezing rain all over Oregon the night before. We noticed on the way down that the transmission light was on but Craig's parents informed us that the transmission had been replaced but the electric indicator had not been re-attached. Long story short, while I was driving and my sister-in-law was in the passenger seat we began to smell something just south of Redding, Cali around 10:00 PM. I saw a large factory ahead and asked Ariel if she smelled it too and we thought that it must be the pollution. All of a sudden the transmission slipped. That told me that smell was coming from us and I pulled over. Black smoke instantly puffed out the sided of the hood and Ryan got out of the car. He took one look at the Rosa and said, "Guys, get out!".
Ariel and I looked at eat other and instantly hopped out while the guys in the back took their sleepy sweet time. I saw a flash of light and thought for a second that Ryan had a flashlight out. The flash fell down and turned into a burst of little flame in the grass along the road. I leaned down to see that the entire underside of the engine was dripping fire. "Guys!" I yelled. "For real, get out, the car is on fire."
They grabbed a few more things and then got out to see what was going on.
We suddenly panicked because we didn't know that cars don't explode when on fire and we ran a few hundred yards and watched as the flames enveloped the entire engine.
Our thought process from pulling over went from "Bummer, now we will have to get the car fixed" to "the road trip is definitely over" to "how do we get back?"
By now the car was on fire enough that we began to feel bad for ourselves as we were basically watching out lap tops, cameras and other items facing their melted doom. Suddenly, like out of a movie, a semi truck screeched into the gravel as a man with a fire extinguisher jumped out before it stopped and rushed to our car. Before we knew it the front flames where down to a drip again. The driver of the truck was out and, approaching us he hollered, "Well, ya want your stuff out?"
We were already to accept the loss of all our stuff so it took us a second to follow after him. We couldn't get the back latch open and the driver had the for sight to see the car was totaled and asked Craig if he could smash the window in. They smashed it in with the empty fire extinguisher and we took one load a hundred yards back. By this time the flames reached the front of the car again and that is went I remembered the propane tanks for the stove in the car top carrier. I yelled that we had to get it of and we ripped the straps and pulled it away from the flames and off the back end. The truck driver yelled, "Last load!" and we ducked under the black, lung burning smoke and pulled out what we could. Somehow before all of this we had called 911, and in the 15 minutes it took them to get there Rosa went from barely burning to totally enveloped. Rosa began to beep the alarm as her emergency lights turned on. The beeping went on like she was crying for help. Eventually the beeping faded as if she had died. We all looked at each other chuckling for a second because Rosa had gone out with style and with so much drama. Suddenly there was a loud bang and we all instinctively ducked. The tires, super heated, were exploding. The fire trucks had arrived, but the car was too hot for them to extinguish with what water they had, so let let her burn out. The final pop was from the fire extinguisher as it shot out the car after exploding from pressure.
After the flames died down the firemen sprayed the deceased Rosa down. No longer red, but a solid black, she looked like nothing but a shell. The steering wheel had melted off, all the seats were nothing but metal and my camera which had been in there had left no trace. We lost quite a few items, but not as much as we could. The fire marshal didn't know what to do with us as we were quite cheery. The way we looked at it was we were alive and had most of our stuff.
The very nice police officers of the area drove us to a hotel where we soon realized we smelled of burning everything. Luke's parents came and got us and we all made it home safely. We have yet to go to the Grand Canyon.
We never got to thank the truck drivers or even learn their names. They drove off as the fire trucks arrived. But they really are our heroes.

Our start

I just came upon pictures from our 6 month dating anniversary. I had the idea for this journal a while ago and am finally getting it off the ground. I am going to start with our 6 month of dating where Zeph took me on a romantic hike through falls and then read me a letter he wrote to me. At the end of the day we had driven high to the crest of the Columbia Gorge. My head rested on the corner of his shoulder and I could suddenly feel his heart beat faster as he told me for the first time that he loved me.
I then told him, "I think I love you too."
We laugh now at my 'thinking' I loved him.