Moving

We spent all weekend packing.

We hate packing.

It always takes so much more time than you would think.

The house we have been renting for the past year we have to be out of by the 31st (Yes, that would be tomorrow)

Stephen has been in the field all last week and didn't get home until 4pm on Sunday.

Poor guy was exhasted but I kept throwing boxes at him.

We moved everything we own into the garage of the new house.

We haven't closed on our new house but we have an agreement that we can keep our things in the garage while we rent a place for about a month.

I know many of you are not familiar with the island so here is a little picture to help you understand our current situation.

Black dot = Schofield Barracks where we both work.

Red dot = The house we have been living at for the past year.

Yellow dot = The house we are buying

Blue dot = The studio we are renting for April




Yep, we will be living in Kailua, the complete other side of the island. We really like Kailua. It's a really cute area but it's really far from work. By far, I mean like 40 minutes which really isn't that far to mainlanders but for us island people, it's really far. It will be interesting.

Yogurt #7 (Last one)

Brand: The Greek Gods

Type: Greek style yogurt

What is this? The basic difference is that it uses cow milk with about 9% milk fat where as most other whole milk yogurts only have 3.5% milk fat. Also, they do an extra filtering process with the yogurt to give it its creaminess.

Ingredients: Milk, cream, sugar, honey, pectin and cultures

Nutrition: 250 calories, 14g fat, 22g sugar and 6g protein

Taste: Amazing! The honey flavor is really sweet. Really no tartness, which is nice after all the other tart ones. It's also very rich.

Consistency: Thick and very very creamy

Awards: 1st place for most calories

1st place for most grams of fat

2nd place for most sugar

1st place for best taste

Conclusion: Sooooo good! More like a dessert than yogurt. Which is probably why this is the only yogurt I eat now. Health wise, uhhh, you may not want to get yourself addicted. It’s a bad habit.

Yogurt #6

Brand: Siggi’s

Type: Icelandic style skyr

What is this? It’s a traditional yogurt of Iceland that is processed in such a way that to make just one cup of skyr, with all that water going out, you need 3 - 4 times the amount of milk required to make a regular cup of yogurt.

Ingredients: Milk, Agave nectar, blueberries, live active cultures and vegetable rennet

Nutrition: 120 calories, 0g fat, 10g sugar, 16g protein

Taste: Very tart, unbearably tart, in fact, I couldn’t bring myself to finish it.

Consistency: Very very thick (can you tell by the gravity defying that is going on in that picture?), isn’t as smooth and creamy as other kinds of yogurts.

Awards: 1st place for most protein

1st place for least amount of fat

2nd place for least amount of calories

2nd place for cutest label

Conclusion: Really healthy, if you can choke it down.

Yogurt #5

Brand: Ricera

Type: Rice Yogurt

Ingredients: Made with organic brown rice
(again, too many ingredients to bother typing out)

Nutrition: 190 calories, 1g fat, 24g sugar, 3g protein

Non Dairy, non soy, wheat and gluten free, and vegan

Taste: Um, how to I put this, “gag!!” Sorry I can’t be more specific. Not to mention it just looks gross.

I hope you appreciate these great sacrifices I am making for you! I have saved you from a most horrid experience. You are welcome!

Consistency: Um, like, creamy apple sauce? It, being dairy free, I guess, has none of dairy’s creaminess

Awards: 1st place for most sugar content.

2nd place for least amount of fat

1st place for worst tasting

Conclusion: Yuck!! Avoid at all costs!

Yogurt #4

Brand: So Delicious

Type: Cultured Coconut Milk

Ingredients: Made with coconut milk (the list was so long I am not going to bother typing it out)

Nutrition: 150 calories, 6g fat, 20g sugar, 1g protein

Dairy free, soy free, gluten free, and vegan

Taste: I am at a loss for descriptive words, "ew" but not quite "gag"?

Consistency: Smooth but thin, not creamy, gives your mouth a weird, coated feeling

Awards: 1st place for least amount of protein

1st place for most unreadable, unknown ingredients

Conclusion: So NOT Delicious!

The Meltdown

I am having a painting meltdown.

It’s too painful to talk about now.

Summary:

9 paint samples currently on the walls

1 entire living/dining room painted (2 coats) a color I hate

2 color schemes down the drain

3 large pieces of furniture purchased to go with one of the above mentioned color schemes

7 gallons of paint wasted

1 crazy lady with no idea where to go from here

The POD

We decided to get a POD a few months back. (For those of you who don’t know, a pod is a storage unit that they drop off in front of your house and you can take as long as you need to fill it up and they will move it to whatever location you like, for us, our new house) We figured since we can’t start moving into the house yet, we could at least start packing stuff up, and now we wont have to rent a truck. We have now had it in front of our house for a few months. We completely filled it over a month ago but were waiting for the house to be ready for us to move in.

Meanwhile, our friendly neighborhood thugs decided to decorate it for us.





Now, I have never liked graffiti but I have to say there is some graffiti that does take some real artistic talent (though it obviously needs to be channeled into more respectable outlets). The graffiti on our POD on the other hand is just plain stupid.

Yogurt #3

Brand: Whole Soy & Co.

Type: Soy

Ingredients: Soymilk, cane juice, cornstarch, tricalcium phosphate and live cultures

Nutrition: 150 calories, 4.5g fat, 13g sugar and 8g protein.

Taste: Um, it may be better with a flavor but as plain, taste like honey with a weird aftertaste.

Consistency: Smooth but somewhat watery and not very thick or creamy.

Awards: None

Conclusion: Mediocre in awards, mediocre in taste.

Yogurt #2

Brand: Bellwether Farms

Type: Sheep Milk

Ingredients: Sheep milk and live cultures

Nutrition: 130 calories, 7g fat, 7g sugar and 9g protein

Taste: I am again learning my lesson that it was a bad idea to taste these yogurts plain. I have had this yogurt in plain and in strawberry. Strawberry was good. Plain, well lets just say the fruit evens out the flavor better. It was rather tart. It also had another taste to it, like, sheep I guess. Almost, cheesy like.

Consistency: Smooth and creamy

Awards: 1st place for cutest label

Tied with goat for 1st place for least amount of sugar

1st place for least amount of ingredients

Conclusion: Similar to goat milk, healthy, tastes alright, just not plain.

Yogurt #1

Brand: Redwood Hill Farm

Type: Goat milk

Ingredients: Goat milk, tapioca, pectin and live cultures

Nutrition: 100 calories, 4.5g fat, 7g sugar and 7g protein.

Taste: Well, I decided for these tasting to try to get them all in plain thinking that would give me a better way to judge, not so much. I tasted this yogurt a while ago in blueberry flavor and I was surprised to find that it didn’t have that tart goat cheese taste, at least not very much. Not so with the plain flavor. It really tastes awful. It's like goat cheese that has been blended and condensed.

Consistency: A really great really smooth consistency. It is on the thicker side.

Awards: 1st place for least amount of calories

Tied for 1st place for least amount of sugar

Conclusion: Healthy and tasty, just not the plain flavor.

Yogurt

I have decided to do a blog about yogurt, yes yogurt. I’ll understand if you ignore my blog for a while. I know it’s not the most exciting topic. I am sure there are many other blogs with more exciting topics than bacteria infested dairy products. Well enough apologizing, those of you who haven’t deleted me from your favorites and written me off as a crazy lady, let's move on.

Why yogurt? I was inspired one day at Whole Foods when I came across the yogurt section. It was one of those, clouds parting, light beaming, angels in the background “awwwww”ing moments.

Ok so I’m crazy. Now I’ve said it, now lets no longer dilly dally on questions of my sanity.

I realized that I had been living in the dark ages of deciding between Yoplait and Light and Fit.

I had discovered so many more choices, so I of course decided I must try them all. When I met Stephen at the cash register he looked at me like I was nuts and asked “How much is all that going to cost?” I quoted my new excuse for spending money, “It’s for my blog.” Then he gave me an even weirder look and just shook his head and funded my insanity.

So for your reading pleasure I have tasted 7 different kinds of yogurt and have given a write up for each one. I will post one a day starting tomorrow.

Until then, I will leave you sitting on the edge of your seat in excitement, or as you get up to go.

The Fight

The other night Stephen and I got into a fight. I know, it’s hard to believe.

A fiery redhead married to a Vulcan, what could we possibly clash about?
(For those non-star trek nerds, by Vulcan, I mean purely logical and non-emotional)

Anyways, so we got into a fight and went to bed mad, bad I know.

The next day at work Stephen sent me this:


A green rose.

After I got it, I called him and asked “What was that for?”

He said, “Because I’m a jerk.”

I thought that was so funny and just had to share it.

Needless to say, all was forgiven.

The XO

Stephen has officially become XO, or for those of you who don’t know the million military acronyms, Executive Officer. What is the job of the XO? The XO is basically the assistant to the commander, or as Stephen likes to say "assistant commander." So Stephen is in charge of keeping track of all kinds of things for his company and making his Captain look good.

Stephen has been rather bipolar on whether or not he is excited about it. He was really excited when he first found out that he was going to be XO and then a week later he kept saying how much he was going to hate it and he wishes he wasn’t going to be it, and then now he is really excited about it. He is difficult to keep up with. You just learn to roll with it.

So Sunday after church we set up his new office. He was really excited to do this. He had an office as a platoon leader but he shared it with the people in his platoon so it wasn’t really “his” office. When I say he was “excited” to set up his office, I mean he thought for hours about how he wanted it to look, what arrangement of the desks, his philosophy of the room (he has a philosophy of everything). He wanted it to be professional but inviting.

The Before Picture.



After changing around the arraignment of the desks at least 4 times we finally found one that worked.

The After Picture.



The XO.



I told him to look professional and this is what he did. I guess "looking professional" to him means "pretend you're typing on an invisible key board". I love making him model, it’s always funny.

I had to show him how it’s done of course.

Our Dangerous Dog

The house we are renting has been sold which means that a lot of people are coming in and out, appraisers, inspectors, the buyers and what not. Well Saturday was the inspection and the realtor gave us a whole 18 hours notice that our day was about to be ruined.

Let me back up and explain something about Hawaiian and Asian, especially Asian, culture. They are terrified of dogs. I can’t really blame them considering that there are only 2 breeds on Island, pit bulls and Chihuahuas.

I am serious. It’s true.

So when they see Lilo, as hard as it is to imagine, they are terrified of her.

But to them if Chihuahuas are the “safe” breed then something as big as Lilo must be dangerous. Stephen, thinking that this mindset is ridiculous, doesn’t keep a strong hold on Lilo but lets her run up and say “hi” to people. This has caused a lot of heart attacks, figuratively of course, I hope.

Anyways, getting back to the inspection, they ask us to take Lilo when they come and inspect because they are afraid of her. Silly as that is.

We were planning on going to our usual farmers market but we couldn’t because no dogs are allowed. So we decided to go to the one on North Shore because it’s really small and informal so we figured it wouldn’t matter if we brought the dog. We were wrong. We were there about 2 minutes when this “security guard” said we can’t bring the dog because people have gotten bitten before.

Come on! Are you looking at her? Do you really think this a is “dangerous” dog? Really?

So Stephen had to walk Lilo away from the farmers market while I grabbed our groceries. At one of the stands though, they had a kennel full of puppies they were selling, Chihuahuas of course. In very poor conditions and much too young to be separated from their mom but that is the Hawaiian way. I hate seeing it. It’s a good thing Stephen has more self control than me or this post would be about our 6 new Chihuahua puppies.

We then took Lilo to the beach. She loves it. And I love taking pictures of it.

Look at all that room to run!



"Come on dad!"



Playing in the water.





This is where we live by the way, in case you forgot. I forget it all the time.



Shake it, shake it.



Sandy Face.



I took Lilo out farther so she could swim. Sorry for the butt shot. I am rethinking those horizontal stripes right about now.



Confession #238: Sometime I like to pretend I am a model. A very short, very pale model.



Bad hip and all, she still loves to run.



In fact while in the big field (pictured above) she saw one of those white crane birds they have here and just went after it. I mean like full speed running after it as it flew away. I think she overestimated herself thinking she could catch a flying bird.

We then went to Kahuku grill and sat outside with Lilo next to us. It was fun because people kept walking by her and she would stand there waiting to get pet by everyone as they passed by. Most of them were tourist so they didn’t have that fear of dogs and would pet her. That was our Saturday.

BBQ

Last night we barbequed. I usually make Stephen BBQ about once a week or so. It puts him to work and gives me a bit of a break. I say “a bit” because I still have to do all the prep work. I got some albacore during our every other week trip to whole foods and thought it would be good as a kabob.

Here are the raw kabobs next to the lime and cilantro sauce. (I made sure none of that nasty cilantro came anywhere near my kabobs, gross!)



We also grilled some corn on the cob because, well, it’s the best!



Gettin hot.



This is Stephen's grilling face.



Stephen plays with Lilo while the food cooks. He tells her “shhhh” and then they race across the yard.



And of course we have some wine.





The finished meal. We over cooked the fish a little but it was still good.

My Confession

I have a confession to make. It’s rather embarrassing. Here it is, I am addicted to…

The Bachelor.

I am so ashamed!

Now let me say, I have never watched it before and I never plan to watch it again. I was flipping through the channels and I just happened to come across the first episode of this season of The Bachelor. That was it. I was sucked in.

Every week I have turned on that garbage (or as Stephen loves to say, degenerate) of a show. Though there are worse shows. Those Real Housewives shows and Grey’s Anatomy make this look like Leave it to Beaver!

Stephen has even watched it sometimes with me (though he may deny this to his grave). He and I totally agree on it! It makes me feel good because he doesn’t like the hot or slutty girls. His favorite was the virgin who wasn’t the prettiest but was more mature and wholesome.

I try to make myself feel better by excusing it as psychological and relational analysis. It is very interesting to watch relationships develop in such a weird, unnatural way. One thing I am sure of is that no self-respecting woman would go on this show. It’s just an excuse for a guy to be a total player!

The other night was the finale so now I have rid myself of it…now to keep myself from watching the new season of America’s Next Top Model.

Oops, there’s another confession!

Quick Stephen! Unplug the TV!

One thing we can all agree on though, the Bachelor was pretty darn good looking! (No, not as good looking as Stephen)



Though he is really stupid for picking Vienna instead of Tenley! He doesn’t deserve her anyway! (Stephen was even more upset about it than me!)