More Baby Pics

Its been a fun and hectic first week, but Anna is a very good baby, and apart from a rough first night has been an angel. Its also been fun having Lisa here to help with the baby, we're sad she goes home on Tuesday, but grateful for her and Ramie's help. Without them, who knows how things would've turned out.

Jack is excited to have someone else's nose to pick

Anna Claire Weggeland

She's here! Mom and baby are doing great! This is a quick photo dump, more to come...

ouch

Really, I'm not trying to turn this into a Real Salt Lake blog or anything, there will be more cute pictures of Jack and Anna and family fun to come, but first a little footy. With RSL making it to the Western Conference finals, Mikie and I couldn't resist going to the Rio for the last home playoff game, especially with a trip the MLS cup final on the line. Seriously, that stadium is gorgeous, check it:

Mikie and I sat in the ultras section, behind the south goal and it was a blast. Between the singing, chanting, people with crazy Mexican wrestling masks on, and the flares and smoke bombs thrown on the field (and one that landed in our section and nearly choked everyone out), we had a fun time. The atmosphere was electric.

The only disappointing part was the end result, 1-0 to the Red Bulls. The worst part was that RSL hit the post like 3 times, had the majority of possession and lots of good chances, just no one could finish. Terribly unlucky. I can't be too upset, because this team exceeded all expectations, but RSL really were the better team that night, and, had Javi's shot in the 90+ minute gone in instead of hitting the post, the stadium would've gone completely and absolutely bonkers.
{sigh}

Oh well.
The kind of fun part was after we got home, we watched match highlights on mlsnet.com, and Mikie and I make a brief appearance in the crowd. I've taken a screen shot, and highlighted me (holding up my scarf) and Mikie in his red coat, arms crossed. It comes at about the 9 second mark. (click on the photo to enlarge)


Watch the full highlights here
All in all, a great season with a bitter ending, but there's hope that this is the start of good things to come from RSL. End of soccer posts for at least 3-4 months. (Unless Arsenal can somehow win something, anything. Not likely)

pic above from the excellent RSL Boz blog

Computer Nerd

Here's a little movie of Jack typing a letter, he seriously loves touching every button on the keyboard and the computer, and he'll look at the screen at what he typed.

Real Salt Lake goals

Here's a sweet highlight video of the best goals of the season for RSL. After 4 years of horrible teams and disappointing losses, this year, to finally make the playoffs and have a winning team, feels awesome.



2008 RSL Highlight Video from Real Salt Lake on Vimeo.

Happy Halloween!!!

Here is Jack posing as Remy from Ratatouille

Ready for some CANDY!! Jack and Christian went to a Halloween party at our friends, and Jack got to trick or treat for the first time. He was really really worn out by the time he got home.

One pumpkin was designed by Mary and the other is Christian's. I wonder which is which.

We had our neighbors for some chili and pumpkin carving. Mary made a rare appearance from her solitary confinement. Don't worry she just gave orders from the couch for the most part.

Our neighbor's cool pumpkins.

CLUTCH

What's better than scoring in the 90th minute on the road against your arch rival in the last game of the season to secure your team's first ever playoff berth?

Yura Movsisyan is clutch. Watch the magic here

The upside of 7 weeks on bedrest

One of the only good parts about being on bed rest is that I get to watch some good shows. Most of daytime television is a waste of time, especially since we don’t have cable, but one of my new favorites is a local morning program called Studio5. They have a cooking segment on everyday that has been focusing on fall recipes, which are my favorite! I figured I would share the wealth and post a couple of these recipes in case any of you are having fall parties and need some tasty ideas. The pictures don’t do the recipes justice but hopefully they will sound good based on the ingredient list! Also, today they had a segment on about a discount baby website that has fun products, like BabyLegs and Puddle Jumper shoes, for 50-80% off. They have a featured product everyday and sell out pretty fast. So if you want to check them out do it at 9:00 am MST because they can sell out in a matter of minutes depending on the product. The website is www.babysteals.com . Anyway...here are those recipes which look really yummy!


Pumpkin Bread Pudding

Ingredients:
• 5 - 6 cups rustic white bread, cut into cubes
• 1 cup pumpkin spice egg nog (cream may be substituted)
• 1 cup Milk
• 4 eggs
• 2/3 cup Brown sugar
• 2/3 cup White sugar
• 1 cup Pumpkin Puree
• 3 Tbs. Butter
• 1 tsp. cinnamon
• ½ tsp ginger
• Dash of clove
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• ¼ cup sugar
• ½ tsp cinnamon

Method:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees
In a bowl, pour milk and eggnog over cubed bread and stir to coat.
In a separate bowl, whisk eggs with brown and white sugar. Add pumpkin, butter, vanilla and spices. Add to the bread mixture. Stir well. Pour into an 11" x 7" baking dish. Sprinkle top with cinnamon & sugar mixture and bake for 45 - 60 minutes, until set.
Serve with Maple Cream Sauce and whipped cream.

Maple Cream Sauce
Ingredients:
• ¾ cup maple syrup
• ½ cup cream
• 1 ½ Tbs. Butter
• ½ tsp Pumpkin pie spice

Method:
Combine all ingredients in a sauce pan. Bring almost to boil.
Sauce will thicken as it cools.
Serve over Pumpkin Bread pudding.
Also very good over ice cream, waffles or cheesecake.


Caramel Apple Pizza
Ingredients:
• Pizza crust (unbaked)
• ½ can sweetened condensed milk
• ½ brick cream cheese
• 1 Tbsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. nutmeg
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1-2 chopped apples
• Caramel sauce

Method:
Soften cream cheese and mix with sweetened condensed milk and spices.
Spread over crust. Spread chopped apples on top.
Bake at 400 for 15-20 minutes (or according to crust directions)
Drizzle with caramel sauce before serving.

Photo dump part 2!

Here are some random pictures of us (mostly Jack) over the last few weeks.

Grandma Ramie got some pumpkins to put outside the front door, and Jack loves to carry the small one around and drop it. Its just a matter of time until it breaks...

Nice movie star pose. Yes, those are Disney Princess sunglasses, we got them from friends as a gift for Anna, but Jack loves them, what can you say...? He'll be getting a more appropriate pair soon, come to think of it.

Michael came to visit this last weekend, and he and I went to the first game in the new Real Salt Lake stadium, it was sweeeeeeeeet!

See, he's not always the sweet boy the pictures make him out to be

Watching the snow fall

Photo Dump

Here are some pictures of what we've been up to lately. Grandma Ramie has been staying with us and has been a big help! Jack got a ride on scooter/bike thing that he loves to play on and press all the buttons and make lots and lots of noise. The praying Mantis picture is for Soren, we opened the door and he was sitting on our porch. Jack seemed to want to keep him as a pet, but he hopped away before Dad could say no.

Bad things happen when the camera gets lost!

So we got home from Oregon on Sunday and Christian's whole family was already in Salt Lake spending time with Mikie who just got home from his mission. There were lots of moments that we should have captured with our camera except that we lost it!! So here are the two pictures that we were able to take before said camera went missing...

Carly and Christian

Aunt Carly with Jack and Kirsten

Lizanne and Carly were able to get a lot more pictures with their cameras and so hopefully those will be posted soon!

Oregon/Washington Trip

Jack and I made a quick trip up to Oregon/Washington for Emily and Dave's sealing in the Portland temple. We had a really wonderful time and Jack was an angel on our flights even though he has two molars coming in. Thank goodness for Southwest and no seat assignments...we had our own row on both flights. The other people on our flight took one look at Jack and I and kept on moving to another row, which was fine with me. Here are some pictures from our fun trip.

Posing outside the temple

Playing with Aunt Emily in the fountains in downtown Salem

Mom with Lucy and Jack

Soren, Lucy and Jack