Thanksgiving, Gingerbread Houses and Beautiful Trees

The holiday season is the most wonderful time of the year! Our traditions continued this week. On Wednesday we went to the Botanical Gardens for the first time. We went to see the gingerbread houses they had on display. We took our camera for pictures of the houses we liked so we could use some of the ideas for our own gingerbread house. Then, we visited the beautiful indoor gardens. What a great place!

This week we spent quite a bit of time focusing on creating our gingerbread house. Logan figured out measurements and created blueprints from a picture of a house we found on the internet. We rolled out each piece and baked them over the course of the last two days. We had a great idea to use parchment paper this year so we didn't have to pick up the individual pieces to transfer them onto the baking sheet. We assembled the house tonight and will decorate tomorrow! We will post pictures soon.

Logan and I will always remember the Thanksgiving Holidays from Cleveland. This year we went again to the annual Thanksgiving get together with many good friends in the ward. Everyone bakes a few items and there is a smorgasbord of food, great company, and fun friends for Eva to play with. She had fun playing with Alta and Rhoda, and Logan ate more turkey than I have ever seen anyone eat. It was quite spectacular.

Of course we went shopping on Black Friday and we were able to finish up our Christmas shopping! We still have a few things to make, but all of the materials are purchased. That counts, right?

On Saturday we drove to Akron for a Christmas tree festival. This is an event that is held every year and all proceeds go to benefit a children's hospital. Individual donors or companies decorate trees, wreaths, or other Christmas decor and sell it for charity. There are also raffle tickets that you can purchase and place in front of an item (or group of items with a similar theme)in hopes of winning the raffle. These probably were worth between five hundred to a thousand dollars each. We had a great time and will definitely be back next year.

Next Friday we are flying to Utah for the whole month of December. We have a lot of things to finish up before we go. This week will be full of fun activity. We are very excited to see our families. Evelyn is pretty excited too!

This is at the Gingerbread display. Here, we received inspiration for this year's gingerbread house, marking this place as a sacred location.

After seeing all the gingerbread we went and explored the gardens. Evelyn didn't quite know what to make of a giant leaf that had fallen from one of the trees.

At the gardens, I found the angriest plant ever. It looks innocent enough at first (top), but underneath all the leaves it exposes its true nasty character.

Here's Rhoda and Evelyn playing their favorite game- "slap-the-chair"- at the ward Thanksgiving party.

Here's Rachel and Eva at the Christmas tree display in Akron.

Eva had her first encounter with the "Man from the North" at the Christmas tree display. I don't think she was too impressed.

This has nothing to do with our week, but I had to steal this picture off my sister's blog of my Grandma on the Harley she keeps hidden in her garage. Who would have known!

It has been quite a week!

This week has been quite a week for us here at the Hazard home. If you have been following the blog lately then you have probably realized that school has taken up a lot of time recently. Well, this week was different. It was my finals week, which meant that I only had to go to school for a couple of hours each day. I did have to study for a little while before some of the tests, but nothing compared to the middle of the semester. So- what did we do with all the free time?

Well, on Wednesday evening Rachel and I went on a fabulous date. We started by dropping Eva off at the babysitter (an important part of any date) and then went to Aladdin's for dinner. After sampling the great Middle Eastern cuisine, we drove downtown to Playhouse Square where we watched Legally Blonde- the Broadway musical. The show was awesome with fun music and good acting. Also, I learned that Playhouse Square is the biggest theatre district in the United States outside of New York. I love Cleveland for all the fun activities that there are around here. We had a great time while we were "out on the town."

On Thursday night Rachel went to see the midnight showing of Twilight. It's that show about vampires that is based on the popular teenybopper book series. Anyway, Rachel had a fun time with her friends and said that the movie was actually pretty good. She got home around 3:30am and the next day she slept a lot.

On Saturday we went to see Squires castle. It's and old castle-like building on the North Chagrin Reservation not too far from here. It was a cool building and the land it was on is amazing. There are trails all over the place, picnic areas, fishing ponds, and hills for sledding. Yes, hills. I know it is hard to believe, but there actually are hills in Cleveland. We will definitely have to go back many times during the next couple of months/years. Also, to make the day even better I filled our car up with gas for under $20, something I have not been able to do since high school. It really has been quite a week!

I brought our camera on our date night out, but was having so much fun that I forgot to take any pictures. I guess this poster advertisement will have to do. It really was a fun show.

Here's Rachel and her friends acting like girls.

Here we are at Squires Castle. Evelyn loved being outside until it got a little cold- and then she was not shy about telling us that it was time to go. It is an amazing place though and we will definitely be back.

She was a Good Dog

Last night I received some very sad news from my dad. Our beloved family dog, Cassie, was "sent to a better place" at the vet. It was time. She was old, and had arthritis, and her quality of life here just wasn't very good any more. It was still sad though, and I must admit that I let a few tears leak out. Cassie grew up with me and was, at times, my best friend. To some people it may sound sort of petty that a dog could mean so much to a boy, but those people didn't know Cassie. She was a good dog.

Cassie was a boarder collie- a sheep dog, and that meant that she would heard everything. When she was a puppy she would heard the broom as we swept the house and she would try to heard the sprinklers in our back yard and just get a face full of water. She would also try to heard cars until she was run over one too many times and decided that it was better for her health to allow the cars to roam free.

She loved to play fetch. She would fetch anything- tennis balls, racquetballs, soccer balls, golf balls, soft balls. She had several teeth knocked out from catching baseballs. That didn't bother her though, as long as she got the ball. In the winter time she would play fetch up and down the stairs in the house. She could play for hours. Sometimes I would take her to a big field with a tennis racquet or golf club to try and tire her out, but it didn't happen. She would play with her ball all day if you let her.

She also loved to go on walks. All you had to do was say the word "walk" and she would get all giddy and prance around until you let her out. Sometimes for her walk we would let her pull us on our roller-blades or sleds. It didn't matter to her as long as she was out on a walk.

As the years went by, however, she started losing her eyesight. She could no longer see the balls and could no longer muster the energy for walks. Sometimes she would try to play, only to lay down after just a few minutes and spend the next hour recovering. She was 13 years old. Supposedly that is about 91 in "dog years." I'd say she had a good life. Like I said, she was a good dog. She will be missed.

As I looked around in my old picture box, these are the only pictures of her I could find.

Snow is Coming! Hooray!

Snow storms are one of my absolute favorite things! I am very excited for weather this week. Crazy snow is coming our way, but I learned that we moved to the wrong place! There is a place called the 'snowbelt' here in Ohio and we just missed it. I am kind of jealous of the people that live there... I think we just missed it by fifteen or twenty miles. Am I the only one who looks at weather.com and gets really giddy to see snow warnings, extended snow forcasts, and 90% and 100% chance of snow? Well, weather.com is making me really excited. I have looked at it a few times tonight. I am ready to go to bed so I can wake up to a pristine world blanketed in crystal white snow! Evelyn will learn all about snow tomorrow.

Christmas time is coming (I have not forgotten Thanksgiving, but it requires a lot less preparation)! Logan and I have been hard at work making gifts this year. Well... We purchased the material and have spent one day hard at work. Last year I knitted scarves for all of the girls in both of our families, this year we have an idea that both of us can work on together. We are pretty excited.

School is coming to a close for Logan. He has been working on competencies all week and has finals next week. Then, he does not have school until January 5th! Woo Hoo! We have a long vacation ahead of us. Logan is taking boards on December 4th, we are flying to Utah December 5th, and I take my interpreting national certification test on the 6th. When all of that craziness is over... it's party time!

I had a Shade party on Friday, and it was really fun. I enjoy hosting these parties. I am excited for the next one.

This week has been pretty tame in the Hazard home. Hopefully, next week will hold more excitement.

Here is Rachel modeling a Shade shirt from her party- She makes a pretty cute model! She could have been a cover girl.

Ev woke up to find two of her friends visiting her in her crib. She was VERY excited to see them.

The calm before the storm

This photograph was taken at Crystal Rapid on the Colorado River, and it accurately depicts the way I am feeling right now. The calm before the storm. This week was really pretty mellow. On Tuesday we went to the polling station and voted, but that is about all of the out-of-the-ordinary that happened. Like I said- "The Calm."

This week commences "The Storm". Finals and competencies are starting to hit fast and hard and will require a little bit of planning to keep from going crazy. Also, my national boards test is just around the corner and I don't feel quite as ready as I'd like to. Rachel is equally busy trying to study for her big test, fulfilling assignments for her classes, and working. The nice part is that in just a few weeks it will all be over and we can look back and say "that wasn't so bad," and then look forward to an extended vacation with no worries to think about


PS: A while back my cousin Jake Roecker recommended Google Reader to us for keeping up to date with people's blogs. We just wanted to thank him and pass on the recommendation. It has helped us to easily keep up with the 40+ blogs that we follow. Check it out at www.google.com/reader.

Amazing Rachel

There are so many reasons why I love Rachel. I thought I’d write a few of them here:

She is Fun to Hang Out With
While we were living in Provo she would usually drop me off in the morning at my job. One morning, however, she just drove right by the place where I worked and kept on going out to the freeway. I was confused and a little bit irritated at first, but then she surprised me by saying that she had worked things out with my boss (and hers) for us to go on an extended rock climbing vacation! She had already booked hotel rooms in Las Vegas and packed everything that we needed. The next few days were spent climbing, hiking, swimming at the pool in the hotel, and yes, even a little gambling (I won two dollars). On the way home we stopped at Zion National Park for even more fun.

She is Determined to the point of being Stubborn
On our second date I took her rock climbing. I was encouraging her to try a boulder problem (unroped) but she was a bit hesitant. “Trust me,” I said, “I’ll spot you.” She did trust me after some coaxing, but she shouldn’t have since a few minutes later I was driving her to the hospital with a broken ankle. That did not deter her, however, from rock climbing or from dating me (thankfully). After getting married we went climbing about 4 times/week and she was able to confidently jump on climbs as hard as 5.10 (and un-confidently on 5.11).

She is Smart
When she was in high school she was “diagnosed” with two learning disorders, OCD and ADD, and put on medication to “help her cope.” After taking the medication for a while she decided that she did not like the side effects, and that she could figure things out on her own. A few years later she graduated summa cum laude (4.0) with two collage degrees- one in ASL Interpretation and one in Elementary Education. After graduation she has continued her education via online courses and CE conferences. In one month she is taking a test that was once described to me as “the holy grail of interpreters…it takes Jedi Knight skills to pass.” Well, it looks like I am married to my very own Jedi Knight, because from all indications she is going to do great!

She is Caring, Compassionate and Selfless
She received a call one day from Salem Elementary School asking her to become a spur-of-the-moment 4th grade teacher. A tragic accident had killed one of the teachers and most of her family. It was a devastating blow to the small community of Salem, and especially to her fourth grade class. Rachel had worked in the classroom during her student-teaching and was called in to help. Despite having to put other plans on hold, including a major step in her interpreting career, she accepted the responsibility of the 4th grade class for the rest of the year. She received positive feedback from nearly every parent of the students in that class, thanking her not only for the way she helped the kids to cope with the loss of their teacher and friends, but also for being a fantastic teacher who was able to make a fun, interactive classroom. She had such an impact on the students that some of them still write letters to her 2 years later.

She is Amazing
If it isn’t obvious by now, Rachel is a person who could have chosen to do anything she wanted with her life. Seeing this makes me stand back in awe when I see that she has chosen to make her family the number one priority. Every day I come home from school and the house is clean, Evelyn is well taken care of, and she often has some sort of family activity planned. Evelyn and I are both extremely lucky to have Rachel in our lives. Thanks Mango, for everything you do. You are truly amazing.

Halloween Fun and Eva's First Word!

The highlight of this week was, of course, Halloween night. Rachel and I finished carving our second pumpkins during the week and then decorated the front porch as a “haunted house” for the trick-or-treaters. We had a flashing green strobe light, scary music, lots of spider webs, spooky decorations (skulls, tattered cloth, etc), and of course our pumpkins. Rachel and I both dressed all in black and wore creepy masks.

I am proud to say that the overall effect was scary enough to deter some kids from coming onto our porch. It was fun to see them “daring” each other to go and get some candy from us, and we got a lot of good comments from parents and kids alike. It was fun and something we will have to continue in upcoming years.

Evelyn’s highlight of the week, however, was not Halloween (although she did like to scavenge the floor for bits of carved pumpkin to put in her mouth). Instead, she surprised us all with her first word! I looked at her while I was making a bottle and did the sign for “milk” when she surprised me by signing it back. Since then we have been paying attention, and sure enough, she signs “milk” whenever she is hungry, or when she is eating. So smart (I suppose we are easily impressed).

Here are the second pumpkins that we carved (the first are on last week's post). I did the vampire and Rachel did the Dragon. I think they both turned out great!

Here we are on the porch waiting to give out candy.

Here's Eva signing "milk" with her right hand (pumping motion)