Big News

This last week Levi took the EMT National Registry test and passed! Now he is officially EMT certified. Right now, he's not planning to get a job as an EMT, but he hopes the certification will help him get a firefighting position. If he doesn't get on with a department this year, he may look into becoming an EMT for awhile to get experience. He worked really hard to get this certification and I'm very proud of him!

Happy Fall!

Have strawberries about to go bad? Make this!

I made this last weekend to use up my strawberries, and it was so delicious! I followed this recipe, but made bread instead of muffins, which took about an hour to cook. Try it for yourself: http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Florida-Strawberry-Muffins/Detail.aspx

The great state fair of Oklahoma

Last night Levi and I went to the state fair since Levi had never been. Plus, I won't lie, I really wanted a state fair corn dog. Well, I got a lot more than that. In fact, we practically ate our way through the fair. We had roasted corn, a corn dog (which I unfortunately dropped half of), a coke, pizza, a funnel cake, a gyro, and a root beer. We only rode the space needle, which was wise considering all the food we ate.

We both agreed that the best part of the fair is people-watching. People of all walks of life go to the fair and you can tell just by looking at the parking lot! There were all types of cars from an old VW bus to an Escalade.

We had a really great time. I grew up going to the fair, so I knew it would be fun; and now that Levi has experienced it, we decided to make going to the fair a family tradition, especially when we have kids someday.

If you haven't been yet this year, you should go. I took my camera so I could show you just how great it is, but unfortunately I didn't check the batteries before we left. Now you'll just have to go see it for yourself!

*Note from Levi: I love the fair now. Gyros are delicious! However, I have never had one served to me by someone who was wearing the colors of the Greek flag but had a hispanic accent.

Crockpot Beef Stroganoff

I made this yesterday and took it over to Lindsay and Mike's for the football game. It turned out great!

Ingredients
1 lb cubed stew meat
1 can golden mushroom soup
1/4 cup water
1 tablespoon Worcestershire
1/2 cup chopped onion (I used rings on top so I could take them off)
4 oz sour cream

Directions
Mix all but sour cream together in crockpot and cook on low for 8 hours. Stir in sour cream right before serving and serve on top of egg noodles.

Grins & Giggles

Levi and I took our nephew Grayson to the park this afternoon. It was perfect weather and we all had fun!

Checking out some stray mulch

 Levi teaching Gray how to go down the pole like a real firefighter

The best peanut butter cookies ever

This probably won't be the only recipe of the week, but I wanted to take a moment to steal a blog post from one of my friends. Last week, she shared her new-found love of AllRecipes.com. If you haven't been there, you have to try it! You can search for recipes and it will give you the top rated ones so you know they're good. For example, if you search for peanut butter cookies, you will find the one I chose to be one of the top rated ones. Also, you can search by category if you're just wanting to browse recipe options. It gets even better. You can save the recipes you're interested in trying to your online recipe box and also receive a Recipe of the Day by e-mail.

This Web site was immensely helpful when I was preparing this week's grocery list. In fact, I got so excited that I made a list of meals for two weeks instead of one! Then, when it was so rainy this weekend, I couldn't help but bake these peanut butter cookies. I especially love them because they're made with things always found in the pantry and better yet, no flour mess! I would have taken a picture, but I took most of them to work and they're gone. Here's the recipe. Enjoy!

Ingredients
2 cups peanut butter
1.5 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
a pinch of salt

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 and grease cookie sheets. Stir peanut butter and sugar together until smooth. Beat in eggs one at a time. Mix in baking soda, vanilla, and salt. It's that easy! Roll into 1-inch balls and place 2 inches apart on cookie sheets. Do the criss-cross pattern with a fork if you want - it's cute. Bake 10-13 min, then leave them on the cookie sheet a couple minutes before moving to a wire rack. Makes about 50 cookies.

A Sushi Adventure

Since last night was the first night Levi didn't work until 9 or 9:30 all week, he decided to take me on a surprise date. He told me I needed to be up for an adventure and that it was something we had never done before. After making me close my eyes in the car, weaving through neighborhoods and turning around a lot to confuse me, we arrived at Copia, a wine and sushi place in downtown Norman.

First, we walked up and down Main St. because there was an artwalk of sorts (and a new Brangelina exhibit opening at MainSite, but that's another story) and then we made our way back to the restaurant for dinner. Now, I must say I had never tried sushi before, but Levi likes it and I had gotten my guts up to try it in Greece but we never did. So, last night was my night. We started off easy with the lobster bisque. It came with warm bread and was delicious! Then came the sushi.

I ordered cooked sushi because I wasn't quite ready to try the fresh. Baby steps. I got crab meat with cucumber and two other things I had never heard of; I put my pickiness aside to have an adventure. When it came time to take the first bite, I almost chickened out, but Levi told me to just put the whole roll in my mouth. It was awful. The texture was too weird and I had to spit it out. The flavor was good, but not good enough to make me eat it. Levi enjoyed his fresh salmon and the rest of my plate before we headed home for me to get a PB&J.

Next, we caught Up! at the dollar theater (which actually costs $2). It was the best movie I've seen in a really long time. Don't knock it because it's a kids' movie. It had a lot to say about life, love and adventure. You should see it.

All sushi experiences aside, it was a great night!

Climbing in the Wichitas

Levi and I spent our Labor Day in the Wichitas rock climbing. Levi's mom came with us; his great-grandmother, grandmother, and cousin came to meet us for a picnic lunch; and his brother Jake and his girlfriend joined us for the afternoon. Despite a few scraped knees and a sunburn, we had a lot of fun!

Meatloaf & Au Gratin Potatoes

In an effort to fulfill a reader request (Lindsay), I'll try to feature an easy meal recipe at least once a week. I love to find recipes that are easy and can be put together in advance so you can just throw them in the oven when you get home from work. Meatloaf is one of those meals that I make a lot because it's easy, I can put it together the night before and store it in the fridge, and Levi loves its heartiness. So without further ado, here's the recipe:

Ingredients
1 lb. beef (I like to use 85/15 for this; any leaner makes it too dry)
1/2 cup crumbled crackers
2 eggs
1 small can tomato sauce (8 oz)
1 tsp ground thyme
1 tsp ground pepper
4 or 5 tbs ketchup
chopped onions or other veggies, if desired

Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl, scrambling the raw eggs in a smaller bowl before pouring in. I usually leave the thyme and pepper for last and I just shake some over the mixture (I don't actually measure) and then mix it all together again. Spread the meaty mixture into a baking dish and spread a layer of ketchup over the top (again, I don't actually measure). Bake at 350 for approx. 1.5 hours or until the edges are black and there are cracks in it.

I usually make some kind of potatoes to go with this meal, and lately they have been Betty Crocker's au gratin potatoes. They're easy, delicious, and almost everything you need comes in the box, just add milk, water, and butter.

I made this meal last night and it was delicious! Don't forget the crescent rolls!

the Sting of Silence

     I went for a bike ride this morning in that strange place that exists before the morning comes but after it has already chased the night away. It was silent, which startled me. I think this is because most of us experience silence only rarely in a world filled with the sounds of cars, radios, and talking, talking, talking. The silence, then, was unexpected, but that still doesn't fully explain why it was so unnerving.
     I think that silence is unnerving because in it we find it more difficult to silence, as C.S. Lewis put it, "that inconsolable secret- the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence... The secret that we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both." In silence we cannot silence the idea that we not only want something more, something transtemporal and eternal and pure, but we also want to be pulled up into, absorbed by, and united with that beauty and love.
     And out of this longing comes the sting of silence, a bitter-sweet realization that we are not (yet?) what we desire.

You know it's bad...

...when you start dreaming about work. It's even worse when you start sleepwalking because of it. Yesterday I came home from work to Levi asleep on the couch. It's not unusual to find him taking a nap when he's not at work, but it is unusual to find him on the couch. I asked him why he was there instead of in bed and all he knew was that he started out in bed and somehow found himself on the couch. He couldn't remember what had prompted the move.

Then last night as we got in bed, suddenly the afternoon's events came back to him. He said he remembered thinking (in sleep, apparently) that if a customer came, no one would be there to help him. So, naturally, Levi got up and moved into the front room just in case a "customer" came.  I guess this is an indicator that he's been working too much. This week was Levi's first 40+ hour week, so his body must be obsessing over the change.

I remember when I first started working at POE I would have work dreams, too. In fact, I just had another one the other night. Does this happen to anyone else?

Hello World!

This may not be the first post for Em and I's blog, but it is the first post from me. So here I am, throwing my thoughts out into the vast ocean of blogging and just waiting to see if anyone is interested in what I leave dangling from the hook. It seems easy, but I have this problem. You see, I have no idea what to write about, and it doesn't particularly help that I don't know who my audience is. I suppose that my audience is really myself, then.
Hmm... this isn't very interesting. I'm going to go play Wii tennis and see if I get inspired.

Getting there

Yesterday was another exciting day for Levi because he got a phone call from the Oklahoma City Fire Department. They want him to take the physical test! While we expected him to get to because his written test score was so high, it's still exciting for him to actually get invited to take it. Unfortunately, now we have to wait until November for the actual test day. Luckily, we just joined a gym so Levi could train more efficiently (before he was curling his toolbox for lack of weights), so hopefully that'll give him something to do in the mean time.

First day on the job: Take 2

Yesterday was Levi's first day working at the Starbucks on Campus Corner and he absolutely loved it! He enjoys getting to work with people instead of alone (like at Michelangelo's). He actually got both part-time jobs at the same time, but Starbucks didn't want him to start working until August when they had someone leaving.

For now, he's planning to continue working at both coffee shops, as long as the schedules don't conflict. So, if you're going out to get coffee in Norman, it's pretty likely that you'll run into Levi!