6. Bobcats

This past weekend we were supposed to celebrate Lou's, Justin's grandma, birthday. But, because it was supposed to snow in yadkin county we had to reschedule. It turned out we didn't really get much bad weather at all so Justin's parents decided to go visit Tyler as he had the day off. We decided to join them as we had no set plans and we hadn't gone to visit him yet.
Tyler moved to Charlotte last fall and it just hadn't worked out for us to go visit him yet. The drive is not too bad it's only about 2.5 hours from Durham. We hung out at his apartment for a while, then decided to go get an early dinner and go to the Bobcats game.
We went to Brixx's for dinner. I had the roasted chicken pizza, it was pretty good. The best part of dinner was the dessert. Usually, desserts look really good on the menu but are disappointing when you actually try them. This was not the case this time. I decided to try out the raspberry chocolate mouse cake. It was really yummy! I was very pleasantly surprised.
After dinner we drove around downtown Charlotte for a little bit so Justin could see where the new Nascar hall of fame museum is going to be. We got tickets for the game and headed to our seats. The seats were pretty far up but we could still enjoy the game. The bobcats played against New Orleans. Unfortunately, my camera died and I didn't get to take any pictures of the game. The game was enjoyable but the Bobcats lost.
I hadn't been to Charlotte in years and I am looking forward to getting to go back and get to know the area more.

Thanks for reading!

CD #2 Kristen's

1. Dear Prudence- the Beatles
2. Girl- beck
3. Everlong- the foo fighters
4. Make your own kind of Music- Mama Cass
5. Thankful- Caedmon's Call
6. Catch My Disease- Ben Lee
7. Let it Rock- Kevin Rudolph
8. Love Today- Mika
9. No 0ne- Alicia Keys
10. Love is only sleeping- the monkees
11. Tame me to your leader- the newsboys
12. Hungry like the wolf- David cook
13. All these things that I've done- the killers
14. Walk Away- Kelly Clarkson
15. Like it, Love it, Need it- DC Talk
16. No Rain- Blind Melon
17. Maybe I'm Amazed- Pauk McCartney
18. Sweet Child of mine- Guns n' Roses
19. Les Fleur- 4 Hero

This was another fun mixed CD! I had heard many of the songs but some of them were new to me. It was also cool to hear a new version of Everlong. I especially appreciated Make your own kind of Music- Mama Cass, from Lost, or at least I associate it with Julianne and Lost. My favorite new song from this CD is Thankful- Caedmon's Call. I really, really like this song! I had never heard it before but it definitely put me in a good mood every time I heard it.
I am really enjoying this mix CD thing. I need more CDs so I can keep it going!!
Next week's CD : Michelle's

Mix CD # 1 Abby's

Song List:
Matisyahu- Jerusalem
The weepies-Nobody Knows me at All
Maximo Park- Girls who Play Guitar
Mumford & Sons- Awake my soul
Veinna teng- City Hall
the weepies- All Good things
Andy David- Brown eyes
Ben taylor- Nothing I can do
deathcab for cutie- This Charming Man
Brooke fraser- Hymn
New kids on the block- 2 in the morning
Phil Wickham- true love
She&Him- sweet darling
Sandra McCraken- Goodbye George
republi tigers- sinkin' annie down, down, down
Stars- In our bedroom after the war
Sara Bareilles- many the miles
Glen hansard- when your mind's made up
Floogging Molly- If I ever leave this world alive

This being Abby's CD I expected it to be a nice random mix of songs. I didn't however expect to be listening to New Kids on the Block, She&Him, and Phil Wickham on the same CD :)
I have to admit that I didn't know who over half of these artists were before this week.
A few of the songs however I already really liked (Sweet Darling and When your mind's made up). I really enjoyed this CD!! And I am excited to see what the rest of the CDs will be. I plan on making a list of my favorite songs from all the CDs.

Favorite new song: Sara Bareilles- Many the Miles
Next week's CD: Kristen's

5. SNOW!!

North Carolina, at least here in the triangle, doesn't know how to handle snow. I guess it's because we don't get much snow often so there it's easier to just shut down for a few days then to prepare for the snow.
Friday I went out to get some essentials, bread, milk, cereal and a cooler. We figured if we got ice and lost power we would need something to put all our cold things in. Lucky, we never lost power! And we got about 6 inches of snow!!!


I have heard people talk about snow cream but I have never had it so I decided that would be a good try to try out. There are TONS of recipes out there. Most either call for milk and sugar or condensed milk. As I have a lactose intolerance I decided to go with Paula Dean's recipe that calls for condensed milk, also because it called for specific amount of things:
8 cups of snow
1 can condensed milk
1 tsp vanilla.
So first I had to go out side to get snow

Then you add the condensed milk

and mix it all together
Turns out it was pretty yummy! Had we not gotten ice it would have been much smoother but it was tasty none the less.
Sunday we decided to go dig out Justin's car out of the snow as he'll have to go to work no matter what tomorrow. The sun was really warm so while Justin cleared off the Rodea. I decided to make a little snowman.

It was pretty easy to build on the car as there was tons of snow on the car already. Unfortunately, as the sun warmed up the surface it didn't last long ...

Thanks for reading!!

4. Wood burning brick oven

Mom and Marcelo have done a ton of work to the outside of the house in the past couple of years. The news addition is the wood burning brick oven!


The concept is pretty basic, you burn wood to heat up the oven than you bake in it.
For Marcelo's and mine birthday celebration we decided to make pizzas. Mom made dough and sauce and everyone got to make their own little pizzas.

Justin decided to make a meat's lover pizza: pepperoni, sausage and bacon.

Mom getting the oven ready
My pizza baking!! (Tuna and green olives)
Justin's pizza

Ofcourse I had to make a cake. This time it was cupcakes. I decided on Guinness cupcakes filled with chocolate ganache and topped with Bailey's butter cream icing.
They were really tasty and I am not even a fan of cupcakes.

We enjoyed trying out the wood burning oven. It will be fun to play with it once the weather gets nicer!

Thanks for reading!