Bridal Shower #1

This Saturday was my bridal shower; actually, it was the first of two bridal showers. The second one being in Chicago in two weeks. Here are a few highlights from the shower - I'll send you a link to all of the photos. (Thank you A & C for taking over 160 photos!)

The weather was very nice - low 70s once the sun finally came out.
This is gift number 1. It is also the first of three skillets that I received. We only registered for one. This also starts the trend of me realizing that while this is my bridal shower, most of these gifts are for Sean. You see - he's the one who cooks. He'll get up early on weekends and cook us fantastic fat-laden breakfasts; while I'd just as well throw some milk in a bowl of cereal. I do bake however - and I did receive wonderful baking items.
Continuing the trend of receiving gifts for Sean. When he saw this electric griddle in Macy's - I thought his eyes were going to bug out of his head he was so excited. I'm not sure what I'm doing. I think I'm taking an oath to never get between my fiance and his griddle.
And the tradition of gifts for Sean continues...
Since I'm new to this whole bridal shower thing, I'm glad my friend J had the wherewithal to gather all of my ribbons and create this bouquet for me.
After a long afternoon of opening gifts, we were exhausted.
These are the favors I made for my guests; the boxes include lavendar soaps and flower seeds that come in a container decorated with a silk flower (the silk flower represents the type of flower the seeds are for).
Can't wait for Chicago!

Other People's Wedding

Tis the season for weddings. Last weekend we went to our 2nd wedding in a month. It was very nice: big, beautiful, lavish. Everything our wedding will not be.

Theirs: Catholic ceremony (with mass) in CA's oldest mission
Ours: Civil ceremony in parents' backyard

Theirs: Mariachi band (!!!)
Ours: iPod playlist
Not much else to report except to say that it was a beautiful ceremony (although I did think God was going to smite me for not being in a church for over 5 years). But, the Catholics sure know how drill a routine into you: I still knew every single word the priest (and the parishioners) uttered during the entire mass.

And here's a picture of us looking pretty.

Baking

This weekend, I wound up baking. We had friends over Friday night for a marathon "Lost" view-fest - which was a perfect opportunity for me to try out a new cookie recipe. (Well, the recipe is new to me - I'm pretty sure it's at least 40 years old given that the cook book I got it from was first printed in the 60s). I made Chocolate Mint Sandwich Cookies. Like home-made Oreos that tasted like Christmas.

Rather than glob the filling on the cookie with a knife, I decided to add some excitement to my cookie-baking and try my hand at icing out of a bag. It turned out pretty well, I think...


And here are the final results... like I mentioned earlier - they tasted like Christmas. And they were super, super easy to make. Just a chocolate refrigerator cookie with icing.

For the past two weeks, I've been telling Sean that I'd make banana bread once the two lone spotty bananas were bad enough to be turned into banana bread. And Sunday afternoon I finally made Banana Bread with Flaxseed and Pecans. I like this recipe because it calls for whole-wheat flour and it doesn't call for sour cream (it seemed like every recipe out there for banana bread called for sour cream).

We also went on a 12 mile bike ride. One of these days I'll buy a little bag to attach to my bike so I can take pictures of all the places we ride our bikes to.