Happy Birthday Danielle!

Wishing you a very Happy Birthday!  Wish we were all gathered around a cake like this, singing to you.  Enjoy your day!

Much love Danners!

Pasta Recipe!

Hey girls....  So I thought I would post something really quick. So this recipe I got from allrecipes.com and Drew's mom makes something similar so I thought I would give it a go.  It's super easy and way good too!

So here it is.......

Ingredients

• 1 (12 ounce) package bow tie pasta
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 pound sweet Italian sausage, casings removed and crumbled
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 1/2 cup diced onion
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 (28 ounce) can Italian-style plum tomatoes, drained and coarsely chopped
• 1 1/2 cups heavy cream
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Cook pasta in boiling water for 8 to 10 minutes, or until al dente; drain.
2. Heat oil in a large, deep skillet over medium heat. Cook sausage and pepper flakes until sausage is evenly brown. Stir in onion and garlic, and cook until onion is tender. Stir in tomatoes, cream, and salt. Simmer until mixture thickens, 8 to 10 minutes. (here i don't add the cream until some of the liquid of the tomatoes evaporates, other wise the pasta will be soupy)
3. Stir cooked pasta into sauce, and heat through. Sprinkle with parsley.

So some things really quick.  You could easily half it but I do the whole thing because I love left overs.  2nd, I didn't use a whole pound of italian sausage. I think I used like 3 links(sorry if thats gross).  Then I didn't use a whole pound of pasta but probably like a half a pound and then 2 garlic cloves instead of three.  Also I don't think I used the whole 1 and 1/2 cups of cream either.  More like 3/4 cup.  Okay so maybe I did half the recipe but I did use 2 cans of tomatoes.  I like my pasta more runny then not!  

Anyways, love ya gals!

Rach

Snowcation

 As a couple of you know, the snow never stopped coming here last week, and then it came again this week. It's crazy though, because it makes the ENTIRE city stop... and I mean stop.  All of the public schools have been off for 2 weeks.  El and I were both off most of last week.  It was the best staycation ever!  I haven't been with him that much I swear, since our honeymoon, and it was the best!  Even though it was freezing, we just loved hanging out, and not doing much.  I baked and cooked a lot, cleaned my house, and El studied, but it was so much fun.  Here are a few photos of the snow we received just the first night!  It was crazy.  This is a lot for Utah, but for Oklahoma, it's unheard of.  We made all sorts of records, including last night, which was -31!  Yes, you read that right, -31.  But it's supposed to be 70 next week, and I can't wait!
 

This is our back door.  It was so deep. 

This is me trying to walk to our car that first morning.  It was past my knees!

And here I am trying not to get blown away, don't mind the hair.  But this picture shows how high it was on the truck tires, and almost to the bottom of the windows of the house.  Crazy! 

The best part was one night we finally went out to eat.  (ALL of the restaurants closed here.  ALL of the them!  So we went to the Waffle House.  It was both of our first times ever there, and we heard we needed to try it while living in the south, so we did.  It was hilarious.)  But when we were driving there, it was 4 days after the storm and finally snow plows were driving around, but none of them knew what to do.  They wouldn't let the plow part touch the ground, and they plowed it into the center of the roads instead of toward the sides.  They're nuts!  We thought we would apply to be snow plow drivers next snow storm, and show them how it's done.  Ha!  It was pretty funny.

My prescription for anti-depressant living

So I was reading through one of my favorite design books this morning by Jonathan Adler. You've probably heard of him-or not. He is actually a potter, turned potter/designer. His book is hilarious and has a fun take on design. I have to share on of my favorite quotes from the book:
Your home should be like a good dose of Zoloft
A chic home isn't one that is filled with uncomfortable furniture and art that you don't understand. It's a home filled with things that you love and that make you happy. Coming home should be an antidote to the trouble and traumas of everyday life. It should be like hearing your favorite song on the car radio, a first kiss, running into your ex-bofriend and he's fat, being the 100th caller. It shouldn't feel like Sunday night, doing your taxes, eating fiber or getting your teeth cleaned. I'm here to tell you that good home decorating can be the equivalent of years of therapy.

Here is Jonathan with his husband Simon Doonan and their dog Liberache. They are so funny!

These are a few of my favorite rooms he has done

The bottom 2 are his home in Greenwich Village

Love it!

Sampson Turville

No my mom didn't have another baby. We got a puppy! We got him right after Christmas and he is super cute, most of the time. He is a silver lab, kinda rare, it's a recessive gene of chocolate labs. We expected him and Buddy to be best friends, but it is not so. Buddy hates him. Pretty much with every fiber of his being. As you may know, Buddy is not a real dog, and has some issues. So it's been fun to have a real dog that plays fetch and digs and stuff. But poor puppy does not have Buddy to play with. He always tries and buddy has a melt down and we have to separate them. Sampson's favorite thing to do is jump up and bite Buddy's neck meat relentlessly. The other day Sampson bugged him so bad and Buddy got so much anxiety over it, that Buddy literally threw up because of it. Sad.

This poor puppy didn't have a name for a full month of his life. We could not decide on one name that we all liked. Choosing his name included a full hour family meeting on voting for names and at the end we had nothing. His name is now Sampson. No one likes it, but he needed one. My dad calls him Moses because he thinks he looks like an old man. A few of us call him puppy still, and sammy, samps, and sam are a few of his other names. We are probably giving him an identity crisis and that is also probably why he doesn't come when we call him.

This is how he slept for like a month because he didn't actually fit into it after the first 2 weeks

He only allows Mary to hold him like this

Please notice the toilet paper. It is by far his favorite thing to chew and eat. I think by now he has probably swallowed a full roll. He is a chewer. So far he has chewed through cords of merchandise worth $600 that now no longer work. Such as our wii cord, my dad's shoulder massager, my moms computer cord, and so many others.

And here is Buddy. Just in case you forgot him. He has never chewed threw anything, bless his heart, and his only problem is his anxiety.

We're here for the warm weather

So a few weekends ago, my sweet Dad sent my sisters and I to Phoenix, AZ for some warm sun. It was so much fun and so nice to feel the sun for once, and not be in your ski clothes everyday because it's so cold. We stayed at The Buttes and just layed by the pool for a few days. Of course the highlight of the trip was the lazy river with the underwater window. I think we spent a full hour taking these pictures. KK isn't in them because she had knee surgery and couldn't get her knee wet. We attempted a few with just her face in the window, but it was kind of a disaster and she kept thinking she was drowning because she couldn't get herself out of the water, we had to lift her. It was hard to come back, but I'm hanging on to that sun until spring!

Lauren is pretty freaky in this one. She looks totally normal and Eliza and I are trying not to drown!