Christmas Time Is Here...

The best time of the year is here and I am enjoying all of it but the SNOW!

A few items I am looking forward to over the next few weeks:

*NO WORK for two weeks... I am taking my vacation time and going to enjoy every second of it!

* Seeing my husband....since today he spent most of his day on campus prepping for finals and I have a feeling that is how it will be for the rest of this week!

* No snow for a week while we are in California visiting our families for the holidays!

* Seeing my sister for the first time since she has been home from Italy... I am also excited to

see what she brought me home!

* Seeing the rest of the family!

* Our YW Christmas Lesson I prepared today! Its going to be AWESOME!

* Bringing my girls (Paris and Ally) home with us so I don't have to worry about them while we are gone!

* Enjoying Christmas Music the whole way to CA!

* My cousins Wedding! (Which includes seeing the distant family... CANT WAIT!)

* Our 2 Year Anniversary

Here are a few shots of our Month so far...

WOW… it has been a while since we last updated our Blog!

A lot has been going on in the Hardy House since March. I will give you a few highlights of the past 6 months:

April- We took a trip to Utah for Scott to go to Conference for the first time! We stayed with Jessica and Reece our cousin’s. Sunday while watching conference with them and made tons of Yummy treats for breakfast, it was a great weekend!

We also had a weekend get away for Easter and went with our amazing friend Meg and Ry to Jackson Hole. We had a great time relaxing, enjoying the last of the snow, and scott put on an easter egg hunt for me in our hotel room... SO CUTE.. I have an AMAZING HUBBY!

May- Scott Turned 24!

My old boss who is now my boss’s boss, Melissa got baptized! I got to go home for it and it was great to see how happy she was from finding the thing she has been missing in her life! She asked me to speak which was a neat opportunity!

Sarah (Scotts Sister) went to the temple for the first time and it worked out that it was the same time we were going to be in town for the baptism so we were able to be there!

June-Scott played Soccer for the School this semester so it was fun to Cheer him on! Sadly I missed half of his games cause I had to go to CA for work half of June and July.

July- We spent most of the time apart as I had to go back to CA for 4 weeks for work! It was not an easy month for us but we made it and it worked out where Scott was able to come down a few times over the weekends. When he came out to visit we went to the Del Mar Fair and he bungee jumped! (Crazy Kid!)

August- We moved to a much LARGER and CUTER place right around the corner from our old apartment. WE LOVE IT! It’s a two bedroom, two bathroom, plus a den and two family rooms, and a dinning room! It is AMAZING! The den is kind of like a Sun Room so we made it my office. It has a sliding glass door that takes you to our backyard…. we even have a cute little tree house and deck! It is way more than we need but for the past year we have been from a bedroom at my parents house and then into a two-car garage so our time in a SMALL place is finally paying off!

We went to Yellowstone with our good friends the Drapers one weekend!

We took a week vacation and went down to Zion National Park in Utah. We spent a few days there and then hung out in Utah! We had a few major family events taking place with the Rogers Family (my mom’s side of the family) We had a cousin come home from a mission, grandma in town visiting, and the first great grandbaby born, baby Lola! It was a good time visiting and being around for all the fun family events!

September- Scott started school back up and is enjoying it so far but I am feeling a little bit like a widow again, he locks himself in the room we call the “dungeon” until dinner and then is back in there until bedtime!

I put on a baby shower for Lindsey Draper and made my first Fondant Cake! I was excited it turned out super cute! I still wish Brookie was here to help me cause I know she would have made it 10X better but I did make her proud! The baby shower was a lot of fun and we have a great turn out! Next week Christina and I are putting on Meg's Baby shower and we are excited since a few good old friends will be coming into town for it so it will be a mini reunion!

Well that is life in the Hardy house! Who knows when I will write again but until then take care!

Hidden Gem

So ever since Ashley and I got married, we have become involved with some new TV shows that neither of us had watched before (we spent so much time just driving to each others house that we hardly watched any TV at all!). Anyways, we had heard some good things about this show...

and Ashley picked up the first two season sets at Best Buy during an after Thanksgiving sale. When we finally started to watch it, we were both hooked. Its all about two (half) brothers, Michael Scofield and Lincoln Burrows. Lincoln is framed for murder and is put into prison while he waits for his death sentence to be carried out. Michael is a very successful engineer who happens to have access to the blueprints of the prison that his brother is in. He comes up with a plan to get himself put into prison, then break his brother out before he goes to the electric chair. You might be thinking (like I was at first), "so the show is about guys that break out of prison, so there's nothing to show after they break out!" Well we are now on season three and there is plenty more "breaking out" being done. Season 5 starts today, so we're going to fill up our TIVO while we try to catch up. Go check it out... its really good!

I-Night Express and a Moose

Alright, here is my (Scott) stab at doing a blog.

So us and some friends try to get together at the Rex on Thursday nights as often as homework permits to go to I-Night Express. For $8 a person with a group of four, you get unlimited bowling, unlimited video games, unlimited pool (billiards), a pizza, four drinks, small ice-cream and a movie... all during 7:00 until close.

This last particular time that we went, as we pulled up we noticed some people looking to the side of the building, so we had to investigate the matter.

Turns out a moose wandered into town.

So since we had all the bowling we wanted, I decided to change it up a bit, as you can see in the video:

Don't worry... I picked it up:

Happy St. Patricks Day!

Today is one of my favorite days of the year!

I love St. Patrick's Day... I am not really sure why since I don't like to be pinched and I don't really like the color green... but I am Irish and I love celebrating the holiday!

Growing up my mom ALWAYS went ALL out for holidays! We usually woke up to a little something in the morning before we went to school and came home to a festive dinner.

I thought I was going to surprise Scott with breakfast this morning since I picked up his favorite Lucky Charms and I turned the milk green... I thought I was being festive enough but to my surprise he beat me to have breakfast ready and he went ALL OUT!!!!

I woke up to Green Eggs, Green Waffles and Green Milk! It was TOO CUTE!!!! Of course I took some pictures to show off his amazing cooking!

(Thanks Babe!!! Your the Best Hubby!!! )

We didn't end the Holiday with just breakfast though! We had a Green dinner too!!! My family makes this YUMMY Green Pepper Pork Loin and since its green I felt it fit perfectly for the day!


All and all we had a fun Green Filled Day! I hope yours was just as great!

The BOMB.COM Stuffed French Toast

So I got this idea from a friend of mine a while back but I finally tried it out!!!! If you have a sandwich maker its a must try!

So you start with two slices of bread, cream cheese, and jelly!

(As you can see I like to make food as light as possible so I go with the low cal whole wheat bread, fat free cream cheese, and sugar free jelly! :)

Spread the cream cheese and jelly on the bread just like a PB&J sandwich...

Mix eggs and cinnamon in a flat bowl...

Take your sandwich and dip it in the bowl of eggs making sure the sandwich is covered....

Lay the sandwich on the sandwich maker and let it cook!

Before....

After...

Add a little syrup and powder sugar and you are ready to go!

( Again I like to go light so I add sugar free syrup or apple sauce which sounds odd but is actually really good on pancakes, waffles or french toast if you are trying to cut calories or you don't want your kids to have too much sugar in the morning.)

YUMMY!!!!!
Let me know how it goes if you try it out!

Ferret Fun and Bath Time!

I finally figured out how to make my videos smaller so they can be uploaded to the blog with a little bit of help from Scott!

Here are a few fun videos of the little girls playing

Yesterday was bath time for the girls! Bath time is not their favorite day! Paris hates the water, Ally does ok with it but they both hate the drying off time. Their fur takes FOREVER to dry so they like to run under the couch and roll on the floor to try and dry off!

Our Wedding Album... Thanks to Heritage Makers

Well its been a little over a year since our wedding but I finally finished our Wedding Album! YIPPIE!

Click HERE to check out our Wedding Album

A few months after we got married I was introduced to the company called Heritage Makers and from the moment I saw what they had to offer I fell in love! You get set up with an online account, create a photo album, publish the album and they mail you the published copy of your bound book! Lots of companies offer similar products but this one by far gives you the most options. You aren't limited on how many photos you place on a page, the options of graphics you can use are endless, and the quality of the prints are amazing!!! If you're creative you can create your layouts/pages on your own and if you don't trust your creativity they have tons of templates you can use that are ADORABLE!

They have books of all sizes, super cute cookbooks, calendars, posters, and even playing cards you can personalize with your family photos!

Mothers day is just around the corner and if your in need of an idea that will make you the best daughter or son in the world check out my website, let me know if you found something you like, and I can set you up with an account to get started on your own project!

Here is the link to my website...

http://www.heritagemakers.com/302049

Here is a peak at a few other layouts I LOVE......

Click here to check out our Calendar

Click here to check our a cute idea for Mothers Day

Click here to check out a Disneyland Trip Layout

Click here for a Cook Book Layout

Click here for a family book idea...What it means to be a (last name)

As you can tell we aren’t great at keeping our blog up to date but I am a little bored waiting for Scott to finish homework on this Sunday evening and thought I would give everyone an update!

So here are a few new events and things that have taken place in our life over the past few months…

1) The Move and Jobs…

As most of you know Scott got into BYU-Idaho and we have moved up to my old stomping grounds of Rexburg Idaho! We made the move the first week of January where we left sunny California to snowy Idaho! Scott and I were hired to be apartment managers for a boy’s apartment complex called Quincy House. If you’re familiar to Rexburg it’s the OLD brick house right next to Taco Time. The garage to the house has been converted into an apartment which is where we live! The apartment is small but it’s actually been perfect for us! It has one bedroom and an office and as we were driving up our owners let us know they were installing a dishwasher and disposal. I am not sure what I would have done without them! We are enjoying the managing job. We have good guys living in the complex so it makes our life easy! If you know of any guys who need a place to live in the summer have them give us a call!

I was very blessed after notifying my job that we would be moving that they offered to keep me working for a few months to finalize a few projects! The “few months” have now turned into a few more months so we are counting our blessing since I have been keeping my eyes open for jobs and there is really NOTHING out there right now!

2) Our Babies… (We aren’t ready for real kids so we got pets!)

In June or July of last year we made a trip to Vegas to pick up a baby Ferret! We named her Paris and NO it was not after Paris Hilton! We stayed at the Paris Hotel while we were there! We crashed my Dad’s hotel room since he was out there for work! We loved her so much we decided she needed a baby sister! Last month we went down to Utah for my cousin’s wedding and picked up another baby, her name is Ally! Paris looks like a raccoon and Ally is a tan cream color but it’s changing to a darker brown. We learned from our amazing “Ferrets For Dummies” book that it is common for ferrets’ color to change from the time they are a “kit” (a baby ferret) to an adult ferret!

We love our girls to death! They are way fun and make us laugh all the time! I was shocked to see my mom even fall in love with Paris when we lived back in California. I think she loved my mom too since she spoiled her with treats! They make great pets since they sleep 18 hours a day they don’t take too much attention other than keeping their cage clean!

3) Callings…

We are loving our new ward! We went to the student married ward our first week here and it just didn’t fit for us so we tried the family ward and knew it was where we needed to be! Our second week in the ward we got called into the bishops office for a calling… we were pleased to hear we were asked to be cub leaders for the Webelos! We love it! We only have two little guys in our group at the moment but they are great! I think I needed this calling for when I do have a boy cause I am clueless and everything that goes on in the program since I was out of the house by the time Ryan was in cubs!

To add to this calling I got asked last Sunday to meet with one of the counselors thinking he wanted to just talk to us about the scouts but I was wrong! He asked if I would serve as the Young Women’s Basketball Coach for our ward! I have never heard of that as a calling but I was all for it! Games start in April but I was asked to hold clinics mid March! I have to touch up on my coaching skills! I am looking forward to it since this will be my first time working with the Young Women!

4) Friends and Family…

We loved life in California but it was hard to have a social life since there wasn’t as many people in the same boat as us… since we moved back to Idaho it has been a blast being around other couples our age and in the same boat as us!

We have had a blast with two of my old roomies who got married over the past year and are now back in Idaho! We see Meagan and Ryan at least 3 or 4 times a week! Our usual activities are playing Wii (Boom Blocks, Tetris, and Mario Party), iNight at the Rex which if you haven’t experienced its quite amazing… with a group of 4 you pay $8 a person for a Large Pizza, 4 sodas, 4 ice creams, a movie, all the bowling you can imagine, pool, even Rock Band! Its $8 well spent! We are on a bowling league and are doing quite well! Our basketball team on the other hand is hurting a little but we have a good time! We also like to make trips to G’s Dairy for yummy ice cream and fresh waffle cones!

Last weekend we made a trip to the sand dunes where Scott got our car stuck in the snow as he pulled a U Turn on the road to stop at some fun hills we found! Luckily a truck was there to help pull us out but it wasn’t an easy job! The day ended up being a lot of fun for such a bumpy start! Scott got to use his snow deck he got for Christmas for the first time and I got back on a snowboard for the first time in a long time! (I definitely don’t belong on a snowboard!)
Our families are making their Summer plans to come out and visit! We are very excited to see them in June and July! I have a feeling we will be making a few trips to Yellowstone but I am looking forward to them!!!
I think that covers everything going on at the moment! We hope all of you are doing well and enjoying life!