Pumpkin Carving

Last night we carved our pumpkins. We were going to wait until today to do them, but Tim has to write his exam tonight for the course that he was in all weekend. We both had a hard time carving our pumpkins this year. There are many toothpicks holding the designs together. Last year not one single toothpick was used. Here’s a little note to all of you that I wish someone shared with me before we started carving last night – cut out the little details first and leave the big stuff to last. I learned the hard way. However, most of you probably already knew that.

Vote for your favorite design. Tim and I have a competition going.









Here are our pumpkins for this year (2006).









These were our’s from last Halloween (2005).

Halloween Baking

I was finished my housework Saturday morning and then started doing stuff in the kitchen. My sister and her husband were coming so I thought I’d whip up a bit of Halloween baking (remember Tim now loves cookies). From 11:00 until 7:00 I was working like mad in the kitchen. I was so wrapped up in it that I didn’t even hear or see Tim outside our house with all his firefighting buddies and the fire truck testing out the fire hydrant. I totally missed them. Anywho, in the kitchen I made special Halloween Rice Krispie squares with little orange pumpkin candies in them, some fudge, and bat and pumpkin sugar cookies. I think they were a hit. Tim ate tons of them and I sent some home with my sister too. I swear it tastes better than it photographs.

In addition to my baking I made homemade turkey soup, a spinach artichoke dip, and a bean dip. It was my first time making turkey soup and the taste was great, but I put too much rice in and.....not so good. However Tim ate it up (he’s so sweet). The spinach artichoke dip was a new recipe and it was good, but I’ll stick with my old recipe for next time. And I’ve got the bean dip down to an art now.

Hardwood Flooring

On Saturday Tim had another firefighting course (actually it was all weekend long). While he was gone it gave me a chance to get caught up in my housework. I did a good cleaning of my bathrooms, kitchen, living room, and floors. For any of you that are planning on putting hardwood flooring in your homes, be prepared to clean them all the time. I love my hardwood. It’s a beautiful walnut color. However, I am constantly cleaning it. The dark wood shows absolutely everything. Now that I have this type of flooring it makes me wonder how much was "hidden" in my carpet in the other house. It makes me a little uneasy thinking about it. But in my new house I do have the cleanest floors around.

Just Another Day

So what have we been up to? We’re just busy, busy, busy. There doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day anymore. It feels like we’re always running. Here’s a typical day for the Nilssons:

6:00am We’re up! Tim starts getting ready for work while Ashlee goes downstairs to make Tim’s lunch for the day.

6:20am Tim’s out the door and goes to feed the horses while Ashlee cleans up from the morning and gets herself ready for work.

7:30am Ashlee leaves Stirling for the 35 minute drive to work.

4:30pm Ashlee leaves work and does all her errands in town (appointments, groceries, returns, Wal-Mart stuff, etc).

5:15pm Tim finishes work (if it’s a good day) and then he does his errands in town before heading home (horse feed, dog food, vehicle maintenance, helping his wife, etc).

6:30-7:00pm Tim and Ashlee both arrive back home (that is if the errands go quickly). Ashlee starts dinner while Tim feeds the dogs and exercises them while going over to check on our foal (and feed the foal again).

8:00pm We eat dinner.

8:30pm Ashlee cleans up dinner while Tim starts on his "Honey Do" list (leaking toilet, mow lawn, clean dog’s pen, hang mirrors, finish our deck, etc)

9:00-10:30pm Tim continues on his "Honey Do" list while Ashlee attempts to get some housework done (baking for Tim’s lunch, laundry, vacuum, clean bathrooms, etc).

10:30pm We call it a night and decide to stop with the chores and such. Tim will finally get his shower. If we’re not too tired we’ll go in our hot tub before bed, but if it’s been a rough day then we just say goodnight and fall asleep watching CSI.

And it all starts again at 6:00am. Yes, that’s a typical day for us. The days when we have home teaching, visiting teaching, firefighting meetings, and Elders Quorum meetings are even worse. I feel as if I’m running on fumes. Our weekends are packed so full we don’t get to recuperate during them. I'm sure the majority of you are going through this as well. I know we're not alone with a busy schedule. Maybe things will slow down a bit this winter........maybe.

Uneventful...

Well I have to say things have been fairly uneventful this past week or so. Thanksgiving was great and Tim and I hosted 14 people for dinner. And then my week was super quiet as Tim had to go out of town for work. I did a whole lot of nothing.

Tim got home late Friday night and then all day Saturday and Sunday he had a Firefighting course. Yes, Tim’s a firefighter in Stirling. But that’s a story all to itself. So Saturday while he was away I caught a ride with my parents who were in Alberta again to go and watch my sister Britnee play volleyball in Taber.

Sunday was a little more eventful as we went to church in Lethbridge for my cousin’s homecoming. Church was at 9:00am and while we were in sacrament meeting someone broke into a bunch of cars in the parking lot and stole tons of stuff. Pretty bold of the dude to smash windows in the daylight, but he did and he got away with it. No one saw a thing.

And that’s about it.

Here comes the weekend

Today is only Thursday, but it’s my Friday. I’m taking the day off of work tomorrow. My sister Jenn is coming to Alberta for the long weekend. She’ll be here by 5:00 – just when I’m finished work. So tomorrow we’re going to grocery shop for Thanksgiving Dinner food and just have a blast. I’m super excited. Her husband has to work (as does mine) so we’ll hang out together and do girl stuff (with her two kids of course – Jayda & Parker). We are just going to have the best time ever. I love hanging out with my sister.

On Saturday the rest of my family will be here too. Mom, Dad, Britnee along with Kimmy & Brendan will be spending the long weekend in Stirling. Yep, the turkey is on at my house. Gotta love Thanksgiving, eh? It’s awesome having my family come to our house to celebrate. Oh ya, I’m excited all right.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

So for two years of marriage Tim has told me that he does not like cookies. It doesn’t matter the kind of cookie…he just doesn’t like them. So I have been going about life this past couple years never making cookies. Until yesterday…

Tim and I are picking up some groceries yesterday and he turns to me and asks why I never make him cookies. Are you kidding Tim? Anywho, he asks if I’d make him some oatmeal raisin cookies. So me, trying to be a good wife, said that I’d make some for him tonight while he’s at his meeting.

Now I don’t have a recipe for oatmeal raisin cookies so I went to some recipe website and found one that had a picture and they looked great (check out the pix). I made them and cooked up the first sheet… and they were HORRIBLE! They were the driest cookies I’ve ever had. They weren’t soft, moist, or chewy at all. They went to my dogs and I didn’t even bother cooking the rest of the dough.

So if any of you have an awesome oatmeal raisin cookie recipe that you could share with me, my husband (who has this new love of cookies) would sure appreciate it. As it turns out Casey, you’re the only master cookie maker.

Farewell to Dude

On Saturday Tim and I sold one of our horses, Dude. After thinking about it for a while we both knew it was the thing to do. He actually sold really fast (in a few days) and we were surprized cuz we didn't thinking many people would be buying in the Fall. It looks like he's got a nice home to go to though. In the next few weeks Tim and I will go to Jaffray and pick up my sister's horse, Ritz. Tim told Kimmy that we'd take care of Ritz for a little while for her. So, we'll be back up to 3 horses shortley. We'll miss Dude though.