Hacer Tamales

Yesterday in Young Womens we had an awesome activity! One of the other YW leaders, Sister Silva, is from Venezuela and taught us how to make tamales, or as they call them in Venezuela, hallacas. Since we only had an hour for the activity, she had alrady prepped most of the ingredients and we assembled them and learned about them. We prepped big banana leaves and then made a cornmeal sort of outer layer and filled it with a meat mixture, vegetables, raisins, etc. Then she had some for us to try since they take an hour to cook. It was great! I had never had tamales before and they were really good and very filling.

Sister Silva said that getting all the ingredients ready for this is the first time she has ever made them on her own without tons of family all working together. They only make them in December and when they make them, they make at least 200 at a time.

Anyways, this ties back to our trip to Georgia last month. Kara and Sam took us to an International Farmer's Market where you could buy food and ingredients from all over the world that you can't find in regular grocery stores. I think there may be a little store down the street a a ways from our house but I have never been in it. To make real tamales, you have to go to someplace like that or else specifically Hispanic stores. I don't remember seeing frozen banana leaves in the Kroger recently...

In summation, I think I need to be a more adventurous cook and try some very new and different things. Thanks to Kara and Sam for exposing us to new foods and cultures! I'll keep y'all posted if Ihave any new developments in this area.

My friends are amazing!

I was just thinking about what a talented lot of friends I have. I think they are all very amazing. What a variety of things they know and do! Among my friends are at least the following talents (sorry, family, you're sitting this one out - yes, I know you have talents too):

I have friends who:

• are very smart and excellent critical thinkers.
• have such lovely voices and sing so well.
• are amazing at science - both understanding and doing.
• are very good and interesting writers.
  
• are great mothers, husbands and wives; I love to see them interact with their families.
• are extremely talented artists in many mediums.
• are some very good cooks.
• are very good photographers and take wonderful pictures.
• are amazing on instruments like the piano, organ, trumpet, flute, drums, etc.
• are great planners and organizers.
  
• can do fabulous things with hair, makeup and fashion.
• have great conversational skills and are very good listeners.
• are very creative and crafty.
• are doctors and nurses (or are working on becoming one).
• are very athletically gifted at soccer, football, basketball, bicycling, etc.

Wow. This is why I love lists - its such an eye opener to see in one glance what amazing people my friends are. I'm so grateful I am able to know all these people! I love you guys!

I almost bashed a burglar in the head today

So today at about 4:00 in the afternoon, I was sitting quietly at my computer desk, just working. Things were going well; I had started to think about what to make for dinner even though I didn't expect Jeran home for about 2 more hours. Diego the cat was sitting on my lap, looking for attention.

All of a sudden, Diego ran from the room and I heard a noise coming from the kitchen at the back of the house. A door was creaking open. Then the sound of small thuds and footsteps. The door was swinging a little again like someone was trying to decide if it was safe to open all the way and go in - it's got creaky hinges. I listened carefully, thinking the wind must have somehow blown open a half-shut door. But no! More distinct footstep sounds!

I stood up carefully and stood by the door of the office, thinking about what our neighbor told us a while ago about break-ins in the neighborhood where people were robbed by thieves coming in through the back door during the day. Diego stood by the corner of the hall closer to the kitchen, frozen. Panic has about gripped me. I decide to try to scare the intruder away by making them aware that someone was here so I opened the closet door near the office and grabbed a heavy mag-light to whack them on the head. I made sure not to close the door too quietly - but even still! More sounds.

I crept quietly through the front room toward the kitchen, wondering what I was going to do when I get to the point were I have to look around the corner. I was all pumped up on scary terrified adrenaline so I peeked around the edge and saw a person in a dark coat and beanie near the open door. After a second, I recognized that it is Jeran! What on earth?! I almost fainted (literally) with relief and draining adrenaline.

"WHAT are you DOING?! I almost bashed you in the head with this flashlight!" Jeran guffawed and informed me that he was going to sneak quietly in through the back door and into the office to scare me. He did not understand that the whole last part of the plan was completely unnecessary since he had already scared me out of my wits just by walking in the back door unannounced.

Afterward, I had jello legs and arms and was seriously pretty faint and shaky and feeling near tears. The whole time I'm explaining what I heard and did, Jeran was like, "Darn, I really wanted to scare you." HELLO?!!!





Also of note, if any of you are wondering "What is the difference between burglary, robbery, and theft?" this linked article is a good answer.

And a Happy New Year

We had a great holiday season this year. Since we did not fly to Utah this year for Christmas, we had plenty of time around the house and decided to put it to good use. We painted our two front rooms over the Christmas week. The front room is green and the dining room attached farther back is blue. I did a most of the priming in the back room myself, much to Jeran's amusement. Suffice it to say after he saw the quality of my painting skills, I learned how to properly shake a paint can and how to blend while you paint.


On Christmas Eve, we went to Jeran's supervisor's house for a nice Christmas dinner. They had fabulous food and it was a lot of fun. I tried prime rib for the first time (at least that I am aware of or remember) and it was amazingly good. I suppose this is not too surprising considering Jen Jen and Billy are excellent cooks. After dinner we went home and moved most of the furniture back into the front room so we could have a nice Christmas day.

On Christmas we opened presents, talked to family on the phone and Skype, and relaxed and took naps. It was wonderfully calm, low-key, and relaxing.

A few days later we drove down to visit Kara and Sam. We had a great time there and got to do some cool things around the city. We stayed up playing dominoes until one in the morning and I went from a great position in first place to the "lead" position after racking up many points in many consecutive rounds. We ate some delicious Thai food and went and saw Marley & Me, which was very sad but very good. Thanks Kara and Sam!


On New Years, we had our good friends over and we played Rock Band and Ticket To Ride and watched Planet Earth and ate yummy food. All in all, I would say it was a great ending to a good year for us. I'm hoping 2009 is even better. After all, it's all what you make of it!

Happy 2009!

Amazing Egg Fact

I found out something very interesting the other day. You cannot crush an egg by wrapping your hand around it the horizontal way and squeezing. It is impossible for people without super-strength. Isn't that amazing?! I tried it and it is true. You should try it too - maybe over a sink in case you have super human strength. :)

Funny cat pictures

I saw these picture and thought they were funny. Enjoy!

UNC Basketball Game

Saturday we went to a UNC Basketball game. It was against Oral Roberts University and we won 100-84 and rarely fell below a 20 point lead since a little while into the first half. UNC is undefeated and top-ranked so even though it was a blowout it was still really fun and crowded.



Jeran liked seeing all the banners they have received from being ACC Champs, NCAA Final Four, NCAA National Champs, the retired numbers, etc.


GO TAR HEELS!