Stabbing and Gut Scooping

Our First Pumpkin

Now then, dear reader, you have read the tale of the significance of pumpkin carving to the Jacobsen household (see post labeled "All It Takes Is 20 Seconds").  This year, Meghan wanted to carve a pumpkin with Reed so she planned a Family Home Evening activity.  At church, Meghan discussed her plans with her adopted sister Adrienne who then exclaimed "that's what I'm doing too!!!  Why don't you and Reed adopt me and Kandace and we'll be your surrogate children slash sisters for Family Night?!?"  Well, Meghan thought this was a great idea and they made plans together. 

Monday night came along and Adrienne and Kandace arrived.  After some pizza and conversation, we all trooped up the hill to Ralph's Thriftway where they had a limited supply of pumpkins left.  (They probably jacked up the price too but who cares....it's about family after all)  We chose our pumpkins with care.  Adrienne was desperately attempting not to get a lopsided pumpkin whilst Kandace chose one that she thought was attractive.  Back at home, Kandace discovered that her pumpkin was, in fact, lopsided.  Alas!!!  Anyway, we paid for our pumpkins and also bought some chocolate refreshment and headed back down the hill. 

We set the kitchen table up in the living room with towels on the floor and used our new knives (thank you, Leesa) to carve the pumpkins while watching the movie Frequency.  We don't have very many Halloween-y movies in our collection yet so that's the most suspenseful one we could find.  It was a lot of fun scooping guts out and planning faces for our pumpkins.  Reed did the knife part because he's really good at it and I did the gut scooping because I'm really good at that part.  I only just realized how ominous those two skills are....hmmm.  

As soon as the movie was done, Adrienne and Kandace took their pumpkins and disappeared into the night.  Halloween's coming soon and we're that much closer to being prepared.  Yay!  :-)

Apparently, Kandace's pumpkin is turning out as planned

Here we are, busily working away.

We carved some attractive pumpkins

All It Takes Is 20 Seconds

A long time ago, in a city not far away, there lived a princess who was not seeking her prince at the time.  Then, one August day her prince arrived!  They played Ultimate Frisbee for an evening but at 9:00pm he disappeared for a time.  Then, one September day, her prince arrived again!  However, like a teaser trailer at the cinema, he disappeared for another time.  In spite of her best efforts, the princess could not stop thinking about this prince who she had met only twice.  His magic spell was already binding the princess' heart.

Finally, one October evening, the princess was driving her Lamborghini Diablo (an evil witch had disguised it as a Ford Minivan) to the humble church meetinghouse for the weekly gathering of single serfs.  As she entered the room, her heart stopped for a moment.  There sat her handsome prince.  She waved at him and pretended to be un-phased but inwardly her mind raced at the thought of how she was going to approach him and engage him in conversation. 

The Magic Pumpkin...the prince is to the right of this picture

As she carved a pumpkin with her lovesick friend (he was missing his love who was away at nursing school in Spokane) she noticed that the handsome prince was positioned quite near to her table.  She attempted not to stare but she could not help but notice the hordes of women desiring his attention.  The princess sighed and wrote the prince off as a lost cause for he would surely not desire her company.

When the pumpkin carving was complete and the time drew near for departure, the princess noticed that the prince was still very near to her table.  She summoned all the courage she could muster and approached him.  He smiled and she drew more courage for his smile was warm and welcoming.  They made small talk until the princess was struck by a moment of bravery.  "Hey!" she said, "I know you like Ultimate Frisbee and we play every Tuesday at the park...would you like to join us?".  After what seemed like an eternity the prince replied in the affirmative.  As the princess attempted to explain the location of the grassy knoll where they would play she decided it was easier to electronically communicate.  "How about you give me your phone number and I'll text you the directions" said she.  The prince smiled and handed her his communication device.  She placed her digits in the device and then he immediately texted her his own digits.  They parted ways and the princess' heart leaped about within her.

As she drove her Lamborghini home, she laughed out loud....for she had gotten his phone number AND had an excuse to communicate with him again.  And this little princess is a pro at looking for excuses to communicate with the man of her dreams! 

And that, dear reader, is how the joyful tale of the prince and princess started....all it takes is twenty seconds of courage to change your life completely. 

The Best Dam Story

Whilst taking a break from homework, I got the urge to write an article on this here blog.  However, I do not know what to write about.  The creative juices in my head aren't flowing because they're being blocked up by a dam of academia related terms.

haha  Dam is a funny word.  I remember one road trip with my parents and sisters where we drove past a dam on the way to Utah.  Well, we were bored and started making dam jokes.  At first they started out pretty mild such as "oh look there's some dam water" and progressed to kind of questionable as far as appropriate is concerned such as "do you see the dam animal?".  We laughed pretty hard and thought we were super clever.  As it turns out, EVERYBODY plays that game!  Oh well, at least we're in good company.  ;-)

"Hoover Dam!" as the penguin from Madagascar would say

Vuong's Doctor's Office Adventure

What you see here is a picture of Vuong in the Jiffy Lube near our house with his hood up.  It's been a little while since his last well child checkup and we decided he needed one with the winter season approaching. Vuong was a little nervous before we got to the doctor's office but when he met the nice Jiffy Lube girl named Megan he figured that he'd be okay.  After all, his owner is Meghan and she's been pretty nice to him.

Vuong had a team of three "doctors" working on him today.  They changed his oil (he had to have high mileage oil because he's getting up there in miles), vacuumed his insides, and washed his outsides.  They also used a wire brush to clean his battery posts.  Vuong thought that was fun because it tickled.  He giggled a little.  However, Vuong was a little disappointed that he didn't get stickers and a lollipop for his day at the doctor.  Maybe next time. 

Nature's Finest Remedy

So the other day my sister gave me the bubonic plague.  Either that or ebola.  But I'm pretty sure it's the bubonic plague.

Take note of the pink leopard pajama pants.  A sure sign of illness. 

Anyway, Reed and I had plans to go to the pizza place with Andrew.  Since I was dying at the time, I had to avoid the merriment.  I stayed home and watched Bones.

When Reed came home he gave me a big hug and presented me with a white cardboard box.  Within that box sat the cure to my ills.  Pepperoni pizza!  I ate a slice and marveled at the power of pizza. 

The next day, I was still sick but at least I was well enough to eat a slice of pizza for breakfast.  I have the best husband ever!

Chocolate Milk: Man's Other Best Friend

A long time ago, Reed's roommate bought a massive jug of Hershey's syrup.  This particular roommate was, at the time, used to enjoying a nightly dose of chocolate milk and liked to make it by mixing syrup into his milk.  Well, the interest faded and this ginormous jug took up a ton of space in a filthy and overcrowded refrigerator filled with items of a questionable and moldy nature.  When the roommate got married, he left the jug behind.  When Reed and I got married we rescued the jug by taking it with us, since chocolate is a very important addition to any refrigerator. 

At almost every dinner, Reed would make a large glass of chocolate milk using the chocolate syrup from the jug.  Earlier this week after months and months of usage, we got to the end of the jug of chocolate syrup.  !!!!!   One admirable aspect of Reed's character is that he does not give up.  And that applies to "empty" containers of ranch dressing, jars of peanut butter or jugs of syrup.  So at dinner time Reed constructed a scaffolding to support the jug while it drained the last iota of syrup.  The scaffolding is made of a salsa jar, water bottle, ranch dressing bottle and the glass of milk.  Shown below:

I married the Cookie Monster

Some of Reed's favorite cookies (Oreo's not included) are no-bake cookies!  I'd never made no-bakes before and saw a recipe on Pinterest.  Well, by golly, it looked easy enough....so I ventured forth with haste to the local Safeway and acquired the supplies. 

Happy Reed

The process of making the cookies wasn't too terrible.  I did manage to spill an entire bottle of vanilla extract all over the oven so now our kitchen smells delightful.  When I looked at the cookie "dough" I decided that shaping cookies was not worth the effort.  So I lined a baking pan with foil and spread out the deliciousness and placed it in the fridge to set. 

After dinner was done I told Reed that he needed to go look at the surprise in the refrigerator.  When he peeked in the fridge a look came to his face that made me think he'd discovered a portal to Disneyland in our refrigerator.  Translation: He was Excited!!!!  :-) 

The cookies didn't last long.  We ate a lot of them.  Actually, we ate all of them.  Yum!