Zombies!

Last night we went to a haunted house!  Bryant and I set up his friend Mike with my friend Julia and we had a lot of fun.  I love haunted houses for some reason...they make me scream but I absolutely love them.  I gave one of the zombies Julia's name and he followed her for a while, whispering her name.  Tee hee hee, I was entertained!  Julia was less so. :)

Bryant, Me, Mike, Julia, Karin, and Devon (Karin & Devon are friends from Bryant's old ward)

Updates

Ok, so I haven't posted in a couple of months, so let me give you a quick update of fun things.  Deep breath...

• I started teaching a new year of fourth graders who all have their own special quirks and problems which have been fun to work through. :)
• Bryant is enjoying his schooling and his work as a TA and considering a global marketing study abroad.
• We have a new nephew courtesy of Jared (Bryant's brother) and Amanda.
• We spent last weekend in Washington visiting said nephew, during which trip I decided that it is too cloudy in Seattle for me to ever live there.
• Bryant and I discovered we are not very compatible when it comes to understanding each others' pictures in Pictionary.
• I discovered that AppleOne is not a very good temp agency.
• Bryant grew a basil plant.
• I began working at the temple on Tuesday nights and discovered that I can recite the 13 articles of faith in 1 min and 30 sec.

Whew.  Now that I write it down it doesn't look like much, but it seemed like I was much busier when it was actually happening.  My goal is to be better at posting on this blog, so hopefully I won't have to do any more updating.  Thanks for reading!

Yummy Food

The other day I had a Relief Society activity.  I volunteered to bring a dessert and my lovely friend Emily had posted the recipe for this dessert on her blog.  They're AMAZING.  Every single woman there complimented me on these bars and I had three different women request the recipe.  I'm making them again tonight for Bryant.  Thanks, Em!

(This picture is also pirated from Emily's blog)

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars with Streusel Topping

from melskitchencafe.com

Base:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened


Cream Cheese Layer:
2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract


Apples:
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and finely chopped
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg


Streusel Topping:
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened

1 cup caramel sauce (homemade recipe below)


Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.


In a small bowl, stir together chopped apples, two tablespoons sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Set aside.


In a medium bowl, combine all the streusel topping ingredients and mix until crumbly. Set aside.


In a medium bowl, combine flour, brown sugar, salt, and cinnamon. Cut in butter with a pastry blender or two forks until mixture is crumbly but combined. Press evenly into a 9X13-inch baking pan lined with aluminum foil. Bake for 10 minutes or until lightly browned.


While the crust is baking, in a large bowl, beat cream cheese with 1/2 cup sugar until smooth. Then add eggs, one at a time and then the vanilla. Mix well. Pour over the warm crust.


Spoon the apple mixture evenly over the cheesecake layer. Sprinkle the streusel topping over the apples. Bake for 30 minutes until the filling is set.


Cool the bars to room temperature. Drizzle with the caramel topping (or plate individual slices and drizzle with topping one by one).


Caramel Sauce:
4 tablespoons butter
1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
½ cups half-and-half or cream
Pinch of salt
1 tablespoon vanilla


Mix butter, brown sugar, half-and-half or cream, and salt in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Bring the mixture to a simmer and cook while whisking gently for 5 to 7 minutes, until thickened slightly. Add the vanilla and cook another minute to thicken further. Turn off the heat and pour the sauce into a jar. Refrigerate until cold. If the caramel sauce has cooled in the fridge long enough to harden, warm slightly before drizzling on bars.

Anniversary

Last week we celebrated our first wedding anniversary.  The jeweler messed up the order for Bryant's ring in a pretty horrific way, so we got a free night's stay at the Anniversary Inn as compensation.  I don't know if I would stay there paying full price, but it was fun!  We got free cheesecake, sparkling cider, and breakfast.  It also had a balcony with a great view (marred by the almost constant rain, but pretty when the weather cleared after dark, see picture below) and a great jetted tub.  The hot and cold were opposite of what the faucet indicated, so there was some squealing and jumping around before we could actually use it.  Once we figured out the temperature, though, we enjoyed relaxing. 

This is on our balcony, once the rain stopped, in our Anniversary Inn robes!

The next day we went out to lunch with Bryant's sister and brother-in-law at Z'Tejas, yum!  It was a pretty low-key anniversary, but I had just finished teaching for the year and it was a much-needed getaway.  Plus, it was free. :)

Welcome

This first post and, most likely, every post thereafter will be written by yours truly, Megan. Bryant is very busy as a student and dislikes anything resembling social networks so I have taken it upon myself to start this blog so people know what is going on in our lives!

I am currently teaching fourth grade at a charter school in West Jordan, while Bryant is attending Brigham Young University studying Marketing and getting an emphasis in Pre-Med. The plan is to finish up the year-and-a-half of school he has, then send out applications to a myriad of medical schools and end up anywhere from Washington to Massachusetts. My part in this plan is to keep us alive on my oh-so-adequate teacher's salary and make sure he studies. I'm much better at the first than the second. Over this summer, I am going to bring in even more money by being a temporary office worker while Bryant toils away at school learning Organic Chemistry and Molecular Biology. We love cooking, eating, and playing games together. At the end of this summer we are even considering a trip based purely on food places showcased on the Food Network. 

Stay tuned for more exciting updates!