A Dazzling Dinner

Well this is my older sister Jari...

She left for an Internship in South Africa today.  I'm not sure why this was a hard good by.  I mean she has been living away from home off and on since 2007.  WHY was this so hard?  Maybe because she is not going to be able to call when ever she wants, or she will not have a laptop, or that she is going to be in Africa... need there be more reasons?  So the Friday before she left, Blake and I (and I really mean Blake helped a lot!) made her a dinner like never before.  

If you know Jari you know that she is a fun loving and the perfect kind of crazy.  She has alway wanted a dinner like the one from the movie Hook.

So we made it happen.  

Except a little more classy, meaning we dressed up (fancy/silly/old fashion) and NO food fight.  I know the food fight is the best part, but we just did not want to clean that mess up.  And the best part of the whole night was that the date was 03/25/2011, Jari's half birthday.  If you do not know, Jari alway has good New Year's resolutions.  One year it was to celebrate everyone's half birthday.  I mean this girl went all out, take a look at what she did for Blake's.

Now on to some photos of our Dazzling Dinner.

That blue stuff is the chicken... I did not know how it was going to work but Blake made it happen.

 And yes we all wanted pictures with the food.

The best part of dinner is alway desert.  We had brownies and coconut macaroons.  Macaroons are my dad's favorite desert, but I have never made them from scratch.  So I tried it, and they turned out amazing.  The best part about them is how easy they are.  

Here's the recipe I used.

Coconut Macaroons

Ingredients

• 1 (14 ounce) can Sweetened Condensed Milk (which I alway have in my cupboard because it's my favorite ingredient)
• 1 egg white, whipped
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 teaspoons almond extract
•     1 (14 ounce) package flaked coconut
  
  
  Directions

1. Preheat oven 325 degrees F. Line baking sheets with foil; grease and flour foil. Set aside.
2. In large bowl, combine sweetened condensed milk, egg white, extracts and coconut; mix well. Drop by rounded teaspoonfuls onto prepared baking sheets; slightly flatten each mound with a spoon.
3. Bake 15 to 17 minutes or until lightly browned around edges. Immediately remove from baking sheets (macaroons will stick if allowed to cool); cool on wire racks. Store loosely covered at room temperature.

I added food coloring to go with the theme of the evening.

 We also had a little tea time.

 Even the boys got into it.

After dinner we played domino.  

 or more like set them up...

I am still finding domino around the apt.

This was going to be the last time we saw Jari till JULY!  But that was not okay with ether of us... so Blake and I drove down to Ocala for one last meal.  And what a better place then a Brazilian Stake house?

If you would like to stock Jari, go to her blog... I give you permission.  

http://jarisantos.blogspot.com/

Spring Break

Some of you may know that Blake and I are going to be moving down to South Florida this summer.  So it just made sence to go and visit for Spring Break.  We left Sunday afternoon and drove to Jonathan Dickinson State Park, where we spent the night.  

The next morning we work up and got right back in the car to drive down to John Pennekamp in Key Largo.  There we were going to try to snokal or maybe scuba dive but instead we just played in the water. 

From Key Largo we started our journey down to Key West.  We took our time driving the 80+ miles, stopping at anything that looked cool. 

Which means we stopped anywhere blake might be able to find animals.

Turning over rocks brought good results.

Blake and I got our VibramFiveFingers as gifts... and we love them!!!

As you can see Blake is much more flexible...

Finaly we got to the southernmost point of the United States.  And only 90 mile from cuba. 

The next day we spent time in the hotel pool, and doing a little homework.  Then rented bikes to ride around the island.  

Trying to weave around the poles.

The only reason we were able to make this trip so affordable was because of Bryan.  He works down in Southern Florida and the Caribbean, so we got to stay this him.
Thanks Bryan!!

Bryan found this cocoon while we where in the keys, and kept it... Well it turned into a butterfly our last day in Miami.

After the keys it was not all fun and games... we did go apartment shoping and I enrolled for some summer classes.

Still we made time to visit the famous South Beach.  This is probably going to be the best part about living in Miami. 

The mango shakes are the best part of every meal.  

We stayed in Miami for one more night then headed to Ft. Laderdale. 

We were so lucky the whole trip, it did not rain once!! (if you know Florida that is crazy to imagine)

 And what started out as a nice day, turned quickly. 

From the the west came an ugly storm.  We saw it when taking out "Ft. Laderdale" picture.  And what started as a nice 20 minute walk down the beach turned into a 5 minute run to the car.  At least we were lucky to have notices it.  When we finally got to the car the blackness had caoght the attention of everyone on the beach, just as the wind began to pick up.  Girls were screaming and children crying, towls were flying out of people hands.  It was amazing.  Blake and I found it funny, and had to take a picture.

The last stop we made before getting back the the Belleview/Leesburg area was West Palm Beach.  Blake and Bryan spent the rest of the afternoon talk tile and I took and nice nap in the car followed by taking myself out for ice cream. (they talked for a long time) 

It was a wonderful and succesful trip down south but, our Spring Break was not over yet.  Saturday we headed back to our home beach of New Smyrna.

  Our main goal for the trip:

1. Hang a Hammock

2. Build a BIG sandcastle

3. And make some amazing memories

First things first, we had to get the hammock up.. it took a little rearranging at the beach.

But it finally was up.  The only thing was when blake (to rigged up the whole thing) sat in it the whole lifeguard stand almost fell on-top of him.  So only the girls got to set in the hammock after that.

Second thing was to build a sandcastle.  My job was to carry buckets water to the to pore on the sand, while they built up a mound.  Our first attempt to build was "a hazard" so we had to level it.  But that did not stop us, we built a new one.  Blake and I woke up the next morning sore... and it was worth it. 

And last thing on the list was to make amazing memories.  Blake grabbed 6 wigs before we left the house, I just don't think he realized it was going to make us so popular on the beach.  We wore them while building the castle and people around us and in cars would stop to take pictures.  (I guess no one had seen that before) We just did not get a whole group picture with the wigs on.