7.23.2011

Graveyard Fields


I know that my blogging has slowed down some. Please, let me give you some reasons why:
1. We currently do not have internet at our apartment, which means that I can't go on my blog at any random point of the day and blog when I feel like it.
2. In order to blog, I have to walk down to the 'Click Cafe' and use their internet, and I don't always feel like doing that.
3. I haven't done too much lately that is blog worthy :(

This week I did have an answer to prayer, though! I had TWO interviews!! I was getting very discouraged on Tuesday because I was hoping that this school with a first grade position would call me for an interview. I had talked to the principal on Monday and she said that 175 people had applied for this ONE job! As the hours passed by on Tuesday, I was beginning to get really discouraged. It has been really difficult because I felt that I had applied to soo many jobs, probably up to the 80's or near 100 now, and I had not heard back from one person! I just kept praying and asking the Lord for something to open up. I really knew that it was all in His hands and that He is the only one who can open up the job for me. On Tuesday, Justin and I went for our run and on the car ride home (about 5:00 pm) I got a call from a principal!!! Praise the Lord!! On Wednesday morning, I received another call from a principal asking me to come in and interview. So on Thursday, I went on my first two interviews!! The positions for both of these jobs are 4th grade. This makes me really nervous because I was ideally hoping for first or second [maybe third] grade. But, a job is a job! The interviews went really well! I am waiting to see if I get offered any of the positions. I am really just praying for the Lord to open the right door. If I am suppose to teach 4th grade, that He will just open that door and give me peace about it. I will keep you all posted!

Today, Justin and I went hiking at Graveyard Fields. It a trail off the Blue Ridge Parkway that has two waterfalls. We were planning on going yesterday but I hurt my knee from Zumba earlier in the week [Yes, you heard that right-Zumba. Only I could hurt myself doing dance aerobics!] so I wasn't able to go yesterday. We had a beautiful day to hike today and we had a great time. Graveyard fields has two waterfalls that you can check out and cool off in. The first one, lower falls, is about a .3 mile walk to get to. The second one, upper falls, is a 1.6 mile hike. We went to the Upper Falls first and then checked out the Lower Falls. Overall, we hiked around 4 miles. Not too bad with a hurting knee!

Upper Falls


He was adventurous and climbed higher.


Lower Falls.

Swimming area at the bottom.

One thing that I love about Asheville is that there are all these fun hikes to go on. It is fun to walk through the mountains and see people cooling off in the waterfalls and swimming holes. Although, I am sure these Ashevillians think that I am this chick from the city. Today I carried my camera in my Vera Bradley wristlet. All of the people we passed in their river shoes/sandals and dogs are thinking who is this girl from the city with French manicured nails and Vera Bradley ;) I might need to get a new back-pack or something!

On our car ride home, we encountered 3 black bears crossing the road! There was a mama bear and two cubs. It was so cool- probably the highlight of my day! This is the best picture that I could get of one of the cubs.

See the bear's face in the middle of the pic?!?

If you would like some other light reading, Justin stared a blog about things to do in Asheville. He is hoping to turn it into a website someday! He has a list of about 60+ things there is to do in Asheville, so we go out and do them and he blogs about them! Check it out!
Asheville To Do

7.17.2011

Max Patch


Today after church, Justin and I took our first 'hike' as Ashevillians with Joelle and Joseph. We drove about an hour through Marshall and Hot Springs to Max Patch. Max Patch is part of the Appalachian Trail and has a beautiful 365 degree view and lots of wildflowers. It was simply beautiful, despite the clouds. We look forward to many more hikes, mountains and curvy roads!

Here are some pics from our excursion:


Trail to the top.

Me and the Hubs.



Joseph. Joelle. Me.

There were Japanese Beetles all around.
Justin actually started talking Japanese to one! What a jip!

In other news, Justin and I are settling into our new home. We have everything unpacked! All we need to do is hang our pictures (which Justin is not looking forward to) and that is also why I have not posted pictures yet. Justin has started his job. He is finishing his training this week and then is all full rotation for the mobile crisis team. I have been keeping myself busy with Zumba (birthday present from J) and cooking dinner. Yeah, not too much! I have enjoyed having some down time, but I feel like this is the week when I will start getting antsy and need to be doing something. I have been applying to jobs like crazy. Please pray that something opens up soon!!

7.13.2011

Jen's Firework Cupcakes


My sister, Jen, was in town to help us move. Let me tell you, if you EVER are moving, call this girl up! She practically packed up our entire kitchen and was an awesome packer. Because of her, nothing broke! She was such a trooper also and helped us load up the U-haul. She helped us carry out our couch and king sized mattress.

Thanks Jen!!

For our 4th of July/Moving/Birthday party, Jen wanted to make some fun 4th of July cupcakes. Now let me give you a little bit of background information on JenA. She is an AMAZING party planner and has to go BIG on everything! She couldn't just have this be a simple BBQ and pool party. No, she had to put skewers on watermelon slices and arrange them into an edible bouquet and she had to have killer cupcakes. Her vision for her cupcakes was to have fun, 3D confetti things springing out from the frosting. We went to Michael's to look for themed toothpicks, and didn't find anything. We then went to Party City and still didn't find anything. So of course, we went back to Michael's and searched for 45 minutes to see if we could create anything. It wasn't until we went to Pier 1 that we found these straws with fireworky things coming off of them and miniature pin wheels. Our hard search paid off because the cupcakes looked FANTASTIC!

Firework Cupcakes Recipe:

* 1 boxed Cake mix of your choice
* 1 tub of Frosting of your choice
* Fun firework embellishments

Work in Progress

They really do look like fireworks blasting off!

Chill and Grill Spread

Jen and I have had a lot of fun times together in Raleigh. Now that we are living even closer together now, I am excited to make more fun memories in Asheville and as well as Atlanta!!

Love you, sis :)

7.11.2011

Taste the Rainbow




Before we moved, we had a little Fourth of July/ Moving/ Early Birthday party at our pool. The guys in the church loved my baking, so I decided that I had to go out with a bang and give them a really awesome cake. The cake also served as my birthday cake. Yes, I made my own cake :)

I found this cake on a blog a while back and I was planning on making it someday when I had kids. I could picture a rainbow colored birthday party and having my 'imaginary' son or daughter blowing out the candles to this cake. Well, I was too impatient and I decided to make it for myself.

Behold.... The RAINBOW LAYER CAKE!!
The whole point of this cake is that it looks really boring and normal on the outside, but once you cut into it.... TA DA... rainbow!! Originally I was going to make the cake from scratch using this recipe: Rainbow Cake, but with moving and everything I honestly didn't have time. So, I will show you how to make the shortened/copy cat version.

To make the cake:

1. You will need 2 White Cake boxed cake mixes. Prepare the cake mix according to the directions on the box. Divide the batter from the two boxes equally into six bowls.

2. Dye the batter.
Use food coloring (gel food coloring works the best) to dye the batter. You will need red, yellow, green blue and purple coloring (and orange). I mixed the red and yellow food coloring together to make my orange and it worked out well.



3. Pour the batter into the cake pans and bake. I only had 2 round cake pans that were the same size so I had to bake my cakes in batches of two, which took quite some time. If you have more cake pans, go ahead and prepare more!

I thought it looked like a Twister board!

4. Once the cakes are cooled, arrange your cake. Start with the purple layer on the bottom, and then layer blue, green, yellow, orange and finally red on top. Put a good portion of frosting in between each layer.


5. Crumb Coat.
Time to crumb coat your cake. Apply a very thin layer of frosting around the entire cake. It does not have to be a perfect icing job. This serves as a mold to hold the cake together and to prevent any colorful crumbs from getting into your final layer of icing. Once the cake is crumb coated, put it in the freezer for 15-30 minutes.



6. Frost the Cake.
Pull the cake out of the freezer and frost the cake. You can use any frosting recipe you would like. In the original recipe they used a lemon buttercream. I decided to just use a plain vanilla buttercream. But be warned, this cake uses A LOT of frosting. It look me 3 batches of frosting (12 cups of powdered sugar) to frost this cake! That also included my wonderful husband running to the grocery store at 1:00am to buy me more powdered sugar, so make sure you have plenty on hand!! Once you cake is frosted, store it in the refrigerator.



7. Add some Pizazz!
Since the cake looks really boring all white, go ahead and add a little detail. I bought some ribbon at Michael's and make a little bow for the outside of the cake. I taped a toothpick to the back of the bow so that it would stay on the cake easily.



8. Enjoy your guest's reactions!
It was so fun to see everyone's reaction to the cake. All of our friends were amazed at the inside of the cake!! I had so much fun baking this cake and I would easily do it again [perhaps when I have some kiddos!]






Hope you all enjoy and Taste the RAINBOW!

7.08.2011

24!


Whew! I know that I have posted in a while but we have been busy packing, loading, driving, unloading and unpacking. We are finally here in Asheville!! I have a lot to update you on, including some fun desserts that I have made recently, but first I wanted to tell you about my birthday!!

Yesterday was my 24th birthday! First full day in Asheville and my birthday! I started off the day by unpacking. Ha ha! I couldn't help it, I felt like there was so much to do that I just wanted to get more done. Justin and to go sign some papers at his new/old job, so I thought that I wouldn't waste any time. He came home with a beautiful bouquet of pink and purple flowers for me :)

Since the last few days have been so busy and stressful I wanted to have a 'chill' birthday. We packed up our cooler with drinks and sub sandwiches and headed out for a picnic at the Asheville Botanical Gardens. There is a little stream there, so we hopped over some rocks and had a lovely little picnic right on the banks of the stream. It was perfect. The sun was shining, the sound of the water trickling by and having my husband right next to me was all I needed. After we were done with our lunch, we walked around the gardens and snapped some pictures. Justin is starting a new blog, which you can check out here!

Picnic Spot



Check out his rolled-up pants! He's turning into an Ashevillian already!
I started calling him my little Huckleberry Finn!



After our picnic, we headed home and just relaxed. I started feeling sick and exhausted yesterday, so I thought it would be good to just lay down and let my body rest. Since I am not a napper, I watched the 4th installment to the Love Comes Softly series!! (I missed you Erica!!)

In the evening we had dinner on the Sunset Terrace of the Grove Park Inn. It was AMAZING! The view was spectacular! We were originally given these "ok" seats and right when we sat down the people next to us left, so we asked the waitress if we could move to their table. The view from that table was even more amazing. We had a nice leisurely dinner, Justin had Trout and I had the Filet. It was so peaceful and romantic.

Outside our new home!

Lookin' good ;)

The Grove Park Inn

The table we snatched!

Whoa! Look at my tan!!


Setting Sun- What a view!!

Even though it was not a huge birthday celebration, it was just what I needed and wanted. I got a relaxing, peaceful day with the man I love :)

Thank you all for the birthday calls, posts and messages!!