Happy Valentine's Eve!!

One of my good friends hosted a most wonderful Valentine's Eve party. It was a black-tie affair and I was SO excited for an opportunity to get all gussied up! I looked forward to the party all week long (I had a lot of time to think about it since I was snowed in all week!) and I anxiously counted down the days of its arrival. I was in charge of making 'decadent' brownies for the party. I knew they had to be good for this formal occasion and I spent hours looking at recipes online! I found an excellent recipe for Truffle Brownies and they turned out really well!

My good friend Ashley was so nice to come over and help me get ready for the big event. I have never been good at doing fancy things with my hair and she did a fantastic job! The party was incredible! My friend rented a roulette table and a guy to run it, he gave everyone some fake money to gamble away as they wished. I don't even know how roulette works so I just pocketed my money and hung out at the food table! :) We had 'mocktails' which included Martinelli's, gingerale, and juice along with raspberries and blackberries to put in them. There was also a wide assortment of refreshments that were so incredibly good! The party was a huge success and I had a wonderful time!! I hope that there will be more occasions such as this!!

Snowpocalypse/Snowmaggedon

Call it what you want but the fact of the matter is that we are experiencing record-breaking snowfall out here in DC! We had quite the storm back in December right before Christmas, but this surpasses that with flying colors! Just when we start to bounce back from one storm another one strikes. This past weekend we got two feet of snow and we were expected to get an additional 10-20 inches between Tuesday and Wednesday. Church and Institute have been canceled for the last two weeks. We were fortunate to have the stake presidency give their permission to have the preisthood administer the sacrament to us in our FHE groups. It was a great experience, I felt like a pioneer back in the day when they met in homes for their meetings. On Friday we closed up our office just after noon and I haven't been back since. Even though the snow has stopped, they have had a difficult time getting all the roads plowed as well as the metro rail system. I have now hit day #6 of being snowed in. I have watched a lot of movies, made some cards and cut out squares of material to make a quilt. We have had neighbors over to play games, drink hot chocolate and eat breakfast. When you start going stir crazy it's nice to have some opportunities for socialization. I have been on few walks here and there to get out of the house and to visit friends, but I haven't gone too far. The day before the storm was supposed to hit last week Jenny and I stopped by the store to pick up some eggs. That was a big mistake! Apparently people here go a little crazy when they hear a storm is coming. All of the essentials were cleaned right off the shelves and the checkout lines went all the way to the back of the store. It was very interesting to observe the panic of everybody. I was amazed to learn that most people don't keep a lot of food on hand, I guess they are just used to going out for meals, it makes me grateful that I have been taught to keep a food storage on hand and it confirms to me how important it really is. It looks like the city will be up and running again tomorrow (then we will have a 3-day weekend!) I am actually excited to go back to work, I have a longing to be productive again! We are supposed to get more snow next week, but we will cross that bridge when it gets here!!

Two Blown Out Tires

So I guess that blowing up a cake in my kitchen wasn't enough excitement for me because the next day I decided to blow out two tires on my car. My roommate Jenny needed to go to Target and she was going to drive but her car battery was dead. I offered to take her there after dinner. We got in my car and made our way down the highway. As we got closer to our destination I began to move over into the turning lane as I approached the stoplight. I must have started getting over a little too early because I skidded against the curb that divided the lanes of traffic. I don't feel like I hit it with a huge amount of force, but it was apparently enough to blow out both of my tires on the driver's side. I did some quick maneuvering and got into the Target parking lot so I would at least be out of the way. I examined the damage and I wished with all my might that I could just hit the 'Undo' button and that it would all go away! I left my car there overnight and had it towed to a mechanic the next day to get it fixed. It was a rough couple of days, but I guess that's how we keep life interesting!

Dinner Group Disaster...

So last night it was my turn to make dinner for our dinner group. I had thought long and hard about what I was going to make. At the suggestion of a friend I decided to make Hawaiian Haystacks. I had been to the store and I had everything I needed to start making dinner as soon as I got home from work. Things were running smoothly, the chicken was cooked, tomatoes were diced, the cornbread batter was in the pan ready to bake and my oatmeal cake batter was in the mixing bowl ready to be poured. I had just put a pot of rice on the stove and cranked the heat to high so it would boil. The oven was ready for the cake so I set the glass 9x13 dish on the stove and I poured the batter into it. My roommate came into the kitchen and asked if she could help. I turned to answer her and then I heard a loud, crashing noise behind me. My cake, and the dish, had exploded! I thought I had turned the rice on to cook but I had turned the wrong burner on, when I set my cake on the stove it was on top of the burner on high heat! How stupid could I be? I was impressed, and surprised, by how far the shards of glass could reach, they were everywhere! It was fortunate that I had turned around when I did or I could have been hit with the glass too. Unfortunately, my gravy was uncovered and since glass had made it over the pot, I could only assume that some had made it into the pot as well, goodbye gravy. I also had to give up my cornbread batter(which was made from scratch by the way) as well since it too was at risk of containing glass. It was 20 minutes to dinner time and now I had to start over, plus clean up the HUGE mess that was made. Thank goodness for Jenny!!! She saved my life, she cleaned up the whole mess while I started cooking again, she is amazing!!! As people arrived they were put to work dicing vegetables and setting the table-what a great team! We were over a half hour late getting started but it eventually came together and everyone was able to eat dinner. It is a good thing that I don't have to cook for two more weeks, it might take me that long to recover!!