January 2010

As soon as we returned to Portland, I received a call about 3 week accounting position with a restaurant company. I took it and it turned into something permanent, which is good. Unfortunately, there are no benefits and it doesn't pay much. Oh well at least I am not bored!

I have absolutely 0 pictures from January, so I will showcase the month with images courtesy of Google.

I turned 31, which has been slightly confusing for me. Multiple times I have said and thought I turned 30 this year. I guess old-age is kicking in. Rusty planned a great dinner with friends at our favorite Cuban restaurant Pambiche. After dinner, we headed to Pix Patisserie, which is a fancy little dessert place. YUM! YUM! YUM! I promise to take anyone that comes to Portland to this little gem.


Rusty and I also made a few lifestyle changes. We started sleeping 8 hours every night, which has been fantastic! I am so alert at work and overall feel great. I am sure this will not last forever, but I am enjoying it while I can.


We are eating more on the vegetarian side. Some of my favorite things are:

Coconut Creamer


Almond Milk


Mexican Stuffed Peppers - I just made these tonight for the first time. YUM!


We also started using cloth napkins. Originally, I liked the idea of reducing the amount of paper towels we were using, but now I love it because it makes meals so much nicer. I would highly recommend fancy cloth napkins to everyone. We got these lovelies from Pottery Barn. I love that store.


Bring on February!

December 2009

Our friend, Andrea, had her gallbladder removed, so we spent quite a bit of time at her house helping out with her kids.

Miss Yetta - Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of the day she wore her purple fairy wings all day. She is quite the girly girl!


Mister Tassew - Such a sweet little man. He says things like "you can help with my homework today and tomorrow Rusty can help me." He likes things to be very fair.


Since this was the week before Christmas, we decorated gingerbread houses. Here is mine.


This is the one Rusty and Yetta decorated.


We headed to Chicago for Christmas, which was lovely. It was the first holiday we spent with my family. I was looking forward to a white Christmas and we almost didn't get one. When we arrived on 12/21 there was no snow. No snow?!?! We did walk Michigan Avenue, which is one of the things I miss doing in the winter and summer. Actually, I miss doing that all year!

In front of the John Hancock building with Mom & Jimmy.


We also got to spend lots of time with my bestie Lindsay! We even got to witness the engagement of Brooke and Brian, which made for a super fun night!


Seriously, I love these two! Whenever we get together there are bound to be shenanigans galore!


We also spent New Year's Eve at Lindsay's house.


Next up, 2010!

Slacker

Hello, my name is Collette and I am a blog slacker.

Excuse #1: I started working full-time.
Excuse #2: I lost my memory card adapter, which means I was unable to upload pictures.

I finally decided to dig out the cords, so all of my pictures are downloaded. Unfortunately, they are not very impressive. I will follow-up this post with the Cliff Notes version of the end of 2009 and 1st quarter 2010.

Deck the Halls

Today was a super fantastic day! As soon as we finished breakfast, we headed out to do some holiday shopping and we are nearly finished. Just one more small gift and the finishing touches for another. I LOVE shopping this time of year.

Rusty got into the spirit with a peppermint brownie and a mocha from Starbucks.


After shopping, we decorated our house. Here is Rusty putting up our tree.


A star for the top.


What would this blog be without a self-portrait by the tree?


Our decorated living room, including our newly purchased couch pillows, garland and berries.


We finished the night off with a mug of sugar-free hot cocoa, which tastes just a great as regular (thank you Costco for selling it in bulk).


On a side note, Rusty tried on a sparkly hat (for New Year's Eve I presume) at Target this afternoon. He has been walking around with glitter on his face ever since and does not seem to mind one bit.

Random Camera Photos

Two blogs in one day? Yes, I am playing catch-up.

The day after we returned to Portland from our honeymoon, Rusty left for 2 weeks for work. Boo! I used one of our free tickets and headed to Chicago to spend some time with Mom, Jimmy, Adam, Terese, Grandma, Lindsay, Seana, Jami and others.

Here is the only photo I have from my trip - Seana's baby Kamryn. We had a girls shopping day.


Here are a few photos I copied from Lindsay's Facebook. Lindsay and I at her Griffin Party:


Seana and Jami karaoke:


The day after we returned to Portland, we attended the Northwest Food and Wine Festival with our friends Nathan and Beija. One word - DELICIOUS!



Bill Simmons aka as The Sports Guy aka as Rusty's idol and man-crush is on a book tour that made it's way through Portland, so of course we had to go. I
do not despise him though, since he encourages shows like The Ruins and Jersey Shore on MTV to be watched in my house. I have an addiction to crap-TV that usually doesn't get fulfilled in my house, so I will take my fix any way I can.


Next, we were off to Utah for Thanksgiving. We stayed with Randy and Annie this time, which was nice because I feel like I got a chance to know Hank and Max. They are probably the people on the Griffin side that I have spent the least amount of time with, until now. Although the drive is awful, 12 hours in a car is 4 hours too many for my liking, it sure is fun to be with the whole bunch!

Once again, I do not have many pictures. Most of the pictures I took include photos of Max, since he likes to have his picture taken, look at it on the camera, and then repeat, over and over.

Rusty and the Griffin kids:


Me and Max:


Pie and games and Grandma and Grandpa Griffins on Thanksgiving Eve:


Rusty and his brothers:


Sorry there were not more pictures, I guess after the hundreds taken on the honeymoon I have been slacking.

Honeymooners

We went on our honeymoon, which was F-A-B-U-L-O-U-S, minus the fact Rusty was slightly sick. Here are the highlights:

Spent a few days on a pre-honeymoon in Long Beach with our friends Kevin and Kelly. We rode beach cruisers, stand-up paddle boarded, surfed (Rusty), went to a comedy show and a dueling piano bar, and ate. We really miss having them as neighbors!


Next off was our Mexican Riviera cruise - Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta. We read out by the pool, ate, attended an ice show, ate, snorkeled, ate, kayaked, ate, hiked through the jungle, ate, attended an audience participation game show, ate, listened to some sweet entertainers, tasted tequilas, ate and then we ate more.

The biggest highlights of the cruise we being on the Love & Marriage Game Show similar to the Newlywed Game, minus it being newlyweds only) and I won $2,000 on my first pull at a slot machine! The game show made us cruise celebrities and the money paid for most of our vacation! Here are a few photos of the trip:

Formal night 1:


Cabo San Lucas:


Mazatlan:


Love & Marriage Game Show Night:


Puerto Vallarta:


Formal night 2:


$2,000 Jackpot:


Sorry for all of the self-portraits, but it is easy. Also, the one photo I have taken by a random guy has Rusty's head chopped off. Oh well.

#8 - Avocado Pulp

Tonight, Rusty was preparing chicken fajitas for dinner and I decided to run to the store to get guacamole and corn tortillas to complete the meal. Usually we have avocado slices to go with fajitas, but guacamole sounded good. Since Rusty had already started cooking, I decided to look for some pre-made guacamole dip. I picked up a package of Dean's and decided to check the ingredients before purchasing. I was appalled and disgusted! Avocado pulp was the eighth ingredient listed. The other things that came before it were:

1. Skim Milk
2. Soybean Oil
3. Tomatoes
4. Water
5. Hydrogenated Vegetable Oil (Coconut Oil, Safflower and/or Corn Oil)
6. Eggs
7. Distilled Vinegar

Something about this seemed very wrong, so I put down the dip and headed up to grab an avocado. We ended up mashing up the avocado (like guacamole minus the kick) and once it was mixed with the fajita seasoning and chicken you could not even tell.