Flan

One night, Edie and Nate made flan from scratch! It was the most delicious flan I've ever eaten. Here's the recipe if you're interested...or just ask us and we'll make it for you!

INGREDIENTS:

• 1 cup and 1/2 cup sugar
• 6 large eggs
• 1 14oz can sweetened condensed milk
• 2 13 oz cans evaporated milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

PREPARATION:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. You will need 6 ramekins or other specialty flan cook ware and a large baking pan to put them in.

Pour 1 cup sugar in warm pan over medium heat. Constantly stir sugar until is browns and becomes caramel.

Quickly pour approximately 2-3 tablespoons of caramel in each ramekin, tilting it to swirl the caramel around the sides. Reheat caramel if it starts to harden.

In a mixer or with a whisk, blend the eggs together. Mix in the milks then slowly mix in the 1/2 cup of sugar, then the vanilla. Blend smooth after each ingredient is added.

Pour custard into caramel lined ramekins. Place ramekins in a large glass or ceramic baking dish and fill with about 1-2 inches of hot water. Bake for 45 minutes in the water bath and check with a knife just to the side of the center. If knife comes out clean, it's ready.

Remove and let cool. Let each ramekin cool in refrigerator for 1 hour. Invert each ramekin onto a small plate, the caramel sauce will flow over the custard.

(It was late, which explains the heavy lids)

Valentine's Day

We should've taken a video of Edie saying, "Happy Valentine's Day!" It's so cute.

I made her a pillow out of some leftover tricot and embroidered her name and a pink airplane on it. She was so excited about and still won't get in or out of the crib without it.

Edie and I made a candlelight dinner for Nate of swiss chicken, asparagus, and lemon rice. I put her hair in sponge rollers and put her in a very cute dress. It's ironic that sponge rollers make her hair straight instead of curly, but she looked very cute! I also finally got out of my pajamas for the first time in days to surprise Nate.

After dinner, Nate took us to Jordan's Furniture store to watch the water show. We also got some ice cream and looked at furniture. A truly romantic evening.

Edie can't get enough of the water show. Good thing it's free.

This is me on Valentine's night, 37 weeks along. Doctor says so far nothing is happening and I have a long road ahead of me.

LOTS OF LOVE!!

Project Blanket

This post is probably boring to most Kanoodle readers, but I promised Ana I would record each step of my first solo, real-life sewing project. I know some of you will think I am completely amazing (and I don't blame you), but I owe my incredible talents to my mom, who taught me how to use a sewing machine, and Ana, who taught me how to make these tricot blankets...oh, and Nate, who gave me my machine.

1. After cutting out the pieces of the front and sewing them together, I taped the tricot material to the floor, stretching it as tight as possible... on my hands and knees...with a basketball in my shirt...by myself. Whew!

2. Next, I cut the batting to match the quilt top and placed it on the tricot.


3. Then, I patiently safety-pinned the layers together, starting in the middle and working my way out to the edges.


4. Afterwards, I stitched in all the ditches, following Ana's orders to go very slowly. I was then able to remove the safety pins.

5. I trimmed the tricot around all the edges and folded and pinned them into place along the border of the blanket.

6. I sewed the border into place, leaving the corners open for my hand stitching.

7. I trimmed the corners and molded and pinned them into place, followed by a tense surgery by hand.

That's it. It's done. Allison can come now.

Yellow

Edie's learning her colors!




She's funny because whenever you ask her what color something is, she always answers with "yellow" first. But she can pick out different colors when you ask her.

It's been great to hear from some long lost friends, like Sarah B., Morgan, Hillary, Tanya, etc. Thanks for your comments!

In other news, Jeremy and Tracy had their baby (#2) Elyse. She's really cute!

Also, Carrie and Tyler have set the date for August 8th (8-8-08) in the Bountiful temple. Hopefully we can get together with all you Utahns/Idahoans then.

Preparing for Sisterhood

I don't think we'll be letting Edie change the baby's diaper by herself for a little while longer.

Allison's blanket

Ok, so Nate bought me my very first sewing machine for my birthday...very early because I have lots to do in the next 5 weeks.

My first priority is Allison's baby blanket. All I've done so far is cut the pieces and lay them out in the anticipated pattern, as shown below:

Next, I have to figure out how to use the machine. Wish me luck! If the blanket looks good when it's all done, I'll post some pictures.

Edie Models New Dress Made by Grandma Knoebel

Belated Christmas Update

Every Christmas Eve, we put on the annual Christmas pageant. Here are Jess and Edie, the poor shepherds.

This is the complete cast: Mandy, as Mary...large with child; Carrie, the donkey; Nate, Joseph; Grandmother, a lifelike angel; Mata, the flock of sheep; Jess and Edie, shepherds; Mom, the innkeeper/wisemen

Edie's Christmas dreams came true when she got her new doll from Prague (I think) from Grandpa Mike. It plays a cute tune of Jingle Bells. Luck would have it that Kalia would receive a similar doll dressed in a Christmas outfit that plays the wedding march!


Christmas Day was wonderful! Grandma and Edie made dinner while the rest of us did nothing.

Luckily, they let us eat it anyway. DELICIOUS!
Note: Carrie was VERY excited

One day, we dressed Edie up in her cutest get-up, complete with a new flower for her hair and a purse (given to her by Steve and Anna). She had to look cute because Steph and Mike were coming over. They are very judgmental about appearances.


Another day, we dressed Edie up again. Jess was having a great time displaying her newly acquired hairdressing and make-up skills. Also, she got her first post-beauty school job at a Salon in Pleasant Grove! If anyone is Utah reads this blog and wants to look HOT, give Jess a call at Aspen Salon.

When we got back to Mass, Nate picked up my Christmas present and put it together all by himself. This is my dream bed, which I thought we would never own. It was quite a surprise!

While in Utah, we also met Carrie's boyfriend, Tyler. Great guy! They obviously like each other a lot because they got engaged this past weekend! Looks like we'll be heading back west this June! CONGRATS!

Wish we had a picture!