Summer: The Way America Used to be

My grandma bought a new house in Star Valley, Wyoming.

Random? Yes. Beautiful? Double yes.

It was so great to be able to spend time with my family. They are the funniest people I know and so awesome to be around. The weather was in the low 70s/High 60s. It was beautiful! When we first drove into Star Valley there was a huge banner that read "The Way America Used to Be" heh heh heh. Yes, the majority of the community is probably over 70 years old.

Thank you so so much to my parents who made it all possible!!

This picture was taken in Jackson Hole. All those antlers are gross, but the town was really beautiful! I got some great old books in a thrift store.

We went white watter rafting down the Snake River. It was so much fun but horribly FREEZING! Doesn't Cody look like he has a mini life vest on in this picture? heh. heh. heh.

Little Mack and baby Raegan bathing. Thanks Michael for blurring Mack's intimates in this picture. Nice touch :) It was very cute and they were having a great time until Raegan pooped up a storm. ..I'm was secretly thrilled it wasn't Mack.

My Nana's house is set on a golf course. We went golfing a lot and had a great time. I was able to keep up with the boys even though I did play from the women tee's

Cody is giving Michael some pretty stellar advice here .

My mom organized 'minute to win it' for us all to play. We played like 15 games over the week. The winners received a $100 gift card to Outback and a sweet trophy. What is that? You want to know who the winner was? ... Me and Cody of course! Woo hoo!! Outback anyone? The game we are playing here is the one where you bounce a ping pong ball off the wall and catch it in the bucket attached to your head. Good times.

Summer: The Act Of

This summer has flown by so quickly I can hardly believe it is almost over! Cody has been working at a law firm that practices consumer law, and I have been busy with my last two online classes. I am pleased to announce that as of Monday I am finished with my bachelors degree in liberal arts. Now I just need to apply for my diploma. It's not exactly the major that I had initially intended, but I worked really hard for what seems like forever and I am really proud of getting my degree. Yay. Anyway, since I absolutely refuse to walk for my graduation and my mom is irate, she is determined to get a picture of me in a ASU cap and gown. ...great. My reason for posting all this is that I in no way intend to purchase an ASU cap/gown just for one blasted picture. Does anyone out there have one that I can borrow for say, 15 minutes or so? :) I would be completely in your debt!

This summer has been filled with fun and family. Here are a few pictures I have collected.
Mack loves water. He especially loves putting his head under the hose and drinking the deliciously dirty water. Yumm.
My face decided it wanted some bangs for the summer. Thanks Janae for humoring my face.
Last week Cody, Mack and me decided to make use of the amazingly cool day and hit up our favorite, pioneer park. It was so fun to go outdoors and play in the middle of the day without immediately losing 10lbs of sweat. This is what Mack does every time we put him in the swing. - He immediately throws his head back and laughs (which might be something he got from me.)
Us being happy at the park.
This is Mack glued to his favorite Baby Einstein movie. Isn't he so handsome? I love this boy so much.
My sister Deanna, who I call Dee, graduated with her Masters in Business something or other from University of Phoenix. Aside from Condalisa Rice, who's talk was really good, the entire thing was, I'm sorry Dee, very boring. (adding to my not wanting to walk for my Bachelors) Good thing I brought my food network magazine.

Cody went to a conference in D.C. for his old job at the Institute for justice. Cody in DC is comparable to me in Disneyland. Giddily Happy.
Me, Mack, Dee, and baby Raegan hopped over to Tempe Marketplace one morning to take advantage of these sweet water jets. Mack loved it, even though in this picture he looks terrified and confused. ha ha.
Dee and baby Raegan. Aren't her pearls darling?

Summer: Feeding

Being MIA from the blogging world for almost 2 months has put me very far behind. In a feeble attempt to cover everything us Huff's have been up to, I will break the next three posts down into;

Summer: Feeding

Summer: The Act of

and

Summer: The way America used to be.

This post is Summer:Feeding

Me and Cody are still cooking up a storm. Was there ever a doubt? I love food too much to let this tradition die. In these pictures are

-our recreation of Monte Cristo sandwiches (Found in the Blue Bayou at Disneyland).. (Ah,mazing!!)

-A salad we tried to recreate that we ate at some cafe in Utah, apple, blackberry cinnamon goodness. (we failed to make it as good as we remembered, but it was still aight.)

We also tried a couple new restaurants.

-The Chuck Box by ASU. I've wanted to eat there forever. It didn't disappoint. True, it was semi hole in the wall,ish, but tasty goodness none the less.

-While on the way to pick up a Hungary Howey's pizza, which is our favorite cheap pizza these days, we drove by 'The Frybread house.' We promptly flipped a U-turn and attended. How long has this secret been hiding? Why has no one ever mentioned this to me before? mmm deep-fried, refried white flour, gluton filled goodness. hmmm what does this closely resemble? .... A doughnut of course. Its no wonder I love fry bread so much. It is simply taking one of my favorite things and making it acceptable to eat for dinner. Fantastic! God Bless the Native Americans who came up with these delicacies. (Fact or Fiction? Did Native Americans actually invent Fry Bread?)

There is so much more, but that is all I have pictures of, so this is where Feeding ends.

Last week my fantastic parents decided to take us to the D-backs game! Woo hoo! Lots of fun and delicious treats .. even though I missed out on the large cookie. We were in the nose bleeds and had a good time! For some reason we ended up going on the same night that a conservative 'support AZ' group went. I am mad I didn't take a picture- they had this sign that was supposed to say ...WE 'HEART' AZ but you couldn't see the heart sign so it just looked like they were holding a sign that said WEAZ, which made me laugh out loud the entire night, after just typing that out I am now realizing that it isn't that funny. hmmm..All of the pics of me and Cody turned out blurry.
These two lovebirds are my amazing parents who took us! Thanks again guys! Don't I have the cutest parents in the world, look at them with their matching Diamond Backs shirts. Ha ha
Well hello sister Dee and Bro in law Michael! .. I apologize for this semi strange photo of you now being posted on my blog.
This was an entirely different day but I couldn't help posting it. Mack LOVES dogs so I thought I would take him to the pet store in the mall. He loved it. He tried to get every dogs attention by banging on the glass, laughing at them, yelling at them, and dancing for them! Um hi, does anyone even buy dogs at the mall? They are like a billion dollars, not that we are in the market for a dog, but I'm pretty sure we wont pay anywhere near what they are asking. ...now half a billion, .. . . .

I had to call Mack's name like 50 times before he would tear his eyes away from the dog for my picture and this was the face that I got. Classic Mack .. I don't know why that line turned blue.

Secret Treasures Divulged

Bountiful Basket is my recent find that I am obsessing over!!! Seriously! You pay 15 dollars and they give you a ginormous amount of fresh produce! Half is fruit and half is vegetables. Whoever thought of this is genius. Ever single week the produce changes according to what farmers have a surplus of. - I love being surprised with new items each week and I love trying new things. This week I got:

2 coconuts

large bag of grapes

10 crunchy and very delicious apples

large bunch of bananas

huge cantaloupe

Stalk of celery

Bunch of lettuce

Tons of green beans

8 tomatoes

8 red potatoes

head of broccoli

I have never eaten more fresh fruits and vegis in my life! Go check this out at bountifulbasket.org!

Summer Corn Fettuccine

The last month of school was rough. I didn't see a lot of Cody and so our cooking nights were put on hold. Summer has brought the return of those nights! I love any excuse to cook delicious fatty food! Last week we created this little gem - Summer corn fettuccine! I don't even need to say how good it was because the picture says it all. We cooked fresh corn, cut it off the cob, and then blended it to create a delicious creamy corn sauce. The highlight of this dish is the fresh dill, bacon, and fresh parmigiana. My mouth is watering.

I think I might be the only person who actually tries recipes off of other people's blogs, so I wont include it. If you do want it though, just leave a comment.

4 years.. andacoupleweeks

On May 16th me and Cody celebrated our 4 year anniversary! Crazy. I love this man more today than I did 4 years ago. He is amazing and I am the luckiest girl in the world. We spent our anniversary going out to dinner and seeing a movie. It was so nice to relax. 4 years is such a long time. I am old.

Overdue

A couple weeks ago me, Cody, and Mack headed over to San Diego for a few days. It was so nice to relax after this past semester!! We stayed at Brerrin's house (my Uncle Brian and Aunt Errin) and lived it up for a few days. Mikallela sp? Errin's friend was nice enough to watch Mack for a day so me and Code could party by ourselves in... you guessed it, Disneyland. It was absolutely beautiful! Hardly any lines at all and it stayed around 60ish all day with a very light drizzle once during the day!

While we were there we dinned at the Blue Bayou and split the Monte Cristo sandwich that I have heard so much about, but never tried. We both fell in love and will be recreating it soon... Ham, Turkey, and Swiss sandwich, deep fried to crispy perfection and served with a tart red jelly of sorts. mmmm....

These pictures are all so bad because like a fool I forgot batteries for our little camera.. so these are cell phone pics.

Of course Mack loved the beach, it had all of his favorite things: Birds. Sand. Water. Space to run.

He kept us on our toes because he loved to walk straight into the waves (no fear) and then got mad and screamed when they knocked him over.

A miracle/tragedy

There I was minding my own business and doing great on my diet. No carbs? No sugar?... yeah, okay, I think I can handle that for a little while. And then this happened....

Krispy Kreme was having an anniversary promotion where if you got there before 5:30 last Thursday you were given a card for a free doughnut and coffee everyday for a year! Thats right my friends!!! FREE DOUGHNUTS FOR A YEAR!!! and Mack counted as a person too, giving us three free doughnuts every day! How could I let this golden opportunity pass me by? Exactly, I didn't. This is the line we stood in, from this angle we are looking at the line behind us and we were about in the middle of the line. Nothing quite like mingling with other KK fanatics!!! This is the 1st fatal flaw in my diet...

I dragged my men with me. Thanks Cody and Mack, you will thank me later when you are enjoying deliciously free bits of heaven.

Fatal flaw #2 happened when I won a Krispy Kreme party!!! Thats right... KRISPY KREME PARTY!!! who does that happen to? I am a little ashamed to admit that I entered the contest by writing a essay as to why I should win a party. It was during finals and I was procrastinating. Anywho, I won 9 dozen doughnuts!!

that means I won 108 doughnuts.

This is me after I ate 13 doughnuts in one day!!! 13! ha ha Oh well diet, we will try again next year after my KK card expires.

On a side note that is entirely unrelated, isn't my little boy amazing! GO SUNS!!! I am so happy that they beat the Lakers!!

I really suck at Title names

I know I haven't updated in a long time but finals absolutely kicked my trash this time around. Oh well, they are just about over and I can finally breath again.

Over the past few weeks a lot has happened, but I wanted to share the kindness of my father after revealing his grossly twisted humor that was demonstrated on my non Krispy Kremes post. My dad, Kev-dawg as we like to call him, is an amazing handy man, and he is also my landlord, so he fixes things over at my place all the time! - A few days ago he was working on my sliding glass door. He went to Home Depot for a part he needed and when he cam back he said, "Hey Rae (what my family calls me), I got you a special treat." Me being on a SUPER lame, strict diet was secretly pleased as punch to have a reason to cheat my diet, so I held out my hand expecting to feel the weight of a delicious snickers, twix, or other candy bar, but instead received this....

Ummm... thanks Dad, I can't wait to listen to my new 'Young Ones' CD. Who doesn't love a little 'Young Cradle' and 'Grievance'?

I was going to sink one of their songs to this blog, but I thought I would spare you all. Kev-Dawg insisted that we listen to it while he fixed the rest of my door. Ha ha. Oh, and then when they started swearing, my Dad also insisted that the dudes who sold it to him convinced him it was nice Christian rap with no swearing!!! Ha ha. Oh Dad.

On a different note. Isn't my little Mack so cute? I think he gets cuter every day!