Yummy Pasta Salad

Tomorrow night we are invited to go over to Jeremy's cousin's (Sara & Brock) for dinner and Jeremy said we'd bring a pasta salad. Jeremy's mom makes the yummiest pasta salad and I always steal it from her when she makes it. So Jeremy got the recipe from her and went shopping and made the whole thing by himself. I was VERY impressed. I just sat in the kitchen and talked to him while he made it.

Again, I need to charge the camera to get pic's of this event, but try to imagine it if you can. ha ha

Pasta update after the dinner:
The pasta was a huge hit. Everyone that ate it kept asking, "Tara, did you really make this or did Jeremy?" lol He made so much that I think we had 10 bowlfuls of it ourselves, had 11 people at dinner eat it at Brock & Sara's, and we gave some to my mom, dad, and grandma and grandpa Grover... and, there was STILL a bit left over.

Good job babe! (Also, congrats to Brock and Sara and their new announcement. Am I allowed to say anything yet?)

Here is the pasta salad recipe:

Lona's Pasta Salad
1- 1 1/2 bags (12-16oz) of the colored pasta with all the different shapes and sizes (sorry, I can't remember the name of the pasta mix)
2 Tomatoes, cubed
2 Cucumbers, cubed
1 Can of sliced olives
1/2 Red onion, diced
1 1/2 - 2 Cups Mayonnaise
Broccoli sprigs (to the amount desired. Jeremy didn't put very much in.)
2 packets of Hidden Valley Ranch
Dillweed to taste

Cook pasta, rinse with cold water and cool in fridge.

Mix all vegetables together and add to pasta.

Mix Mayo, Dillweed and Hidden Valley Ranch together in separate bowl and pour over vege/pasta mix. Stir together, enjoy right away or chill and serve.

Easy eh? Not only is it pretty, but it is yummy! I thought it would also taste good to add some sunflower seeds to it.

Photo Tag

I don't know if Ashley was taggin' "me, Tara" or another Tara, but I will just pretend it was me. :)



This is the fourth pic... My mom took some pic's while at my Bridal shoot and this is one of them.

Heres what ya do..
1) Go to pics
2) Upload 4th Picture
3) Post
4) Tag 4 people

I tag Alayna W, Suzanne H, Melinda C, and Jeremy J!

Happy Baby Shower Jenya

My BFF had her baby shower at my clubhouse today. She is due 5 weeks before me and is having a little girl. It's so funny how the feeling of our showers were totally different just because we both got completely different things. I got all the sports stuff and she got all the frilly, flowery girly things. I love it!

I've never been so excited for one of my friends to have a baby because it's like we've been through the whole pregnancy together.

I need to charge the battery in my camera so I can put a pic of our bellies up. Love ya Jen! Thanks for being one of my bestestest buddies and such a good friend to me through out the years. We had to have been slisters in heaven. :)

SuperX

So, you can see I'm having a wrestless night of no sleep and am still up blogging. I JUST remembered that the US Open was this weekend for this next season of SuperX and because of the baby shower I completely spaced it.

I dated someone awhile back that raced in the Utah Circuit and happened to learn all about this sport by watching him race and got way into the sport... even though it's a total dirthead thing to get in to. I even used to record all the races and watch them again through out the week until the next week end race. Until this year, I have been to all of the final races down in Vegas that end there in May each season. They used to race in SLC, but then decided not to race here... and then found out that they are once again going to be racing at the Rice Eccles Stadium in April for the 2nd to last game. Wahooo!

I LOVE the sound of the dirt bikes, the smell of the gas, the dirt, everything! This is actually one sport I get way into. I even got a dirt bike last summer and to no surprise, totally wrecked in Bear Lake shortly after. I'm also not the most graceful person, so a dirt bike is probably not the best thing for me. However, I was glad that I was wearing a helmet cause I went flying off my bike over the handle bars and skidded in the dirt, head first, coming out with only a sprained wrist. Not to mention that I bent the fender on my bike, broke the brake handle off and had one heck of a time getting down the wrest of the bike trail. (Ok, so my dad had to trade me bikes and I had to ride his back down since mine was risky with out a brake handle.) I thought I would be a speed demon down the trail and didn't turn fast enough to miss a big crevis in the dirt and my front wheel went right down into it.

Also, my dirt bike is vintage/old school. The owner of Monarch Honda in Orem has asked me a couple of times if he can buy it from me and restore it. I have a 125cc 1976 Honda TL (4 stroke) which was given to me by my Grandpa when I told him I wanted to get a bike to learn on. They only made these bikes for 2 years and parts for them are really hard to find. It is seriously the coolest bike though! Here is a pic of one I found online. It looks EXACTLY like my bike.


Here is a pic of me on my bike on my lunch break from work. It's not too great of a pic, but you get the idea.


My hubby isn't to keen on me ever getting on the bike again. He is the low risk taker type... the one that drives way slow everywhere we go and is not very into motorcycles or dirt bikes at all. I am the total opposite. My dad and gramps fixed it from my wreck and I'm hoping to ride it next summer once again at our Bear Lake outing.

My favorite riders:
Ivan Tedesco, Albuquerque, NM-
When Ivan raced in the 125 class, he was my fav, but has since moved up to the 250's which made it hard for me to choose between him and Chad Reed. They don't call it the 250's class anymore though cause everyone pretty much rides a 450.

Ivan is still working his way up right now cause he smoked everyone all the time in the 125s. He was famous for being behind and somehow making up his lap times by pulling ahead. (I could be 'slightly' biased for Ivan because he's hot. ha ha)


AND, Ivan was on MTV Cribs awhile ago: MTV Cribs with Ivan Tedesco

Chad Reed, Australia-
I think I started liking Chad just cause at the time everyone liked Ricky Carmichael. Now Carmichael isn't even racing in SuperX anymore. I believe he dropped out last season to do Nascar. But, I'm a little behind on the news because with the wedding and baby this year, I didn't have time to watch the last season at all. :(


Jimmy "Bubba" Stewart-
Ok, so this kid is crazy fast on his bike and the first couple of years I watched him, he could never make it through a race with out crashing and would never make it to the end of a season with out being hurt. When I saw him race in Vegas a couple years ago, he was out in the first Heat round he raced in. It was disappointing. But I hear he's gotten better and am excited to watch him this season.


PS. SuperX the Movie = No Bueno (Bad acting and Bad story line. Disappointing.)

Alanya Tagged Me ...Again!

8 TV shows I like to watch:

I hardly ever watch t.v. that is one of the quirky things I should've put on the last post cause it's rare (at least I think it is), but I will try to think of at least 8 shows. I always feel guilty if I watch t.v., like I should be doing something more productive. I have a hard time watching any t.v. show all the way through.

1. Anything on HGTV
2. Anything on Food Network
3. A Baby Story (only since I've been pregnant)
4. King of Queens
5. Everybody Loves Raymond
6. The Office
7. ????
8. ???? ...Some stuff on the Style Channel

8 Favorite Restaurants:

1. I never thought I'd say this cause until I got pregnant, I hated it here, but Chilli's.
2. Claim Jumper (in CA only. The one here in Heber is no bueno)
3. In N Out, a classic
4. Rusted Sun in SLC
5. Ruth's Diner up Cottonwood Canyon
6. The Owl Bar, Sundance (does that count as a restaurant?)
7. Kneaders! Duh... my FAV! I don't know why I didn't think of this as #1
8. ????...Again, I'm drawing a blank to come up with 8 (I'm on the spot)

8 Things that happened yesterday:

1. Went shopping with my mom and mother in law
2. Bought way too much stuff for the baby and had to put a lot of it back
3. Had a hot chocolate party with Jeremy's brother's fam and some of the football team at our house
4. Slept in
5. Stared at the baby's room in amazement thinking, "Whoa! We have a BABY's room and a baby/human being on the way."
6. My husband told me I was beautiful and he loves me.
7. Got heartburn (of course)
8. Watched our wedding video with Jeremy's Fam

8 Thing I'm looking forward to...

1. Having the baby (not the actual 'birth' part, but having the baby... the 'after' part)
2. Dressing our little guy up in all sorts of humiliating outfits that I think are cute.
3. CHRISTMAS! Oh my gosh, I LOVE Christmas! (This could've also been on my 'quirky list'... I'm nuts about the Christmas holiday; including that my house already looks Christmasy.)
4. Getting sealed to my family next year
5. Our Bear Lake trip next summer with the fam
6. Not being pregnant and not having any of the crappy things happen to me that are associated with it.
7. My friend Jenya's baby to be born next month. I can't wait.
8. Falling asleep tonight and not having heartburn.

8 Things on my wish list:

1. Being rich
2. Going to Italy
3. Going to France again, but with my French speaking hubby this time
4. Going to Tahiti one day with my Tahitian speaking hubby (good thing they are the same person) ha ha
5. Meeting my mom's birth mother while in Tahiti
6. Getting more schooling under me
7. Starting my own business
8. Liking football and baseball so that I don't have to be bored while being at games and watching games with my husband. (sigh)

8 People I'm tagging:

1. 8 people that want to do it...

TAG

Here are the rules for the tag:

Link the person who tagged you (Alayna)

Mention rules on your blog

Tell about 6 quirks of yours

Tag 6 fellow bloggers

Leave a comment to let them know

6 quirks of mine:

1. I hate it when the windshield wipers are going and there is either no rain/precipitation or not enough on the windshield for the speed they are wiping. I also hate it if it's raining or snowing and the person driving doesn't turn them on ever. It drives me bonkers. I always find my self reaching over and turning them on/off for people or adjusting the speed for them.

2. I always put this on here when people ask, but I will put it again. I HATE it when my feet get wet. Ewww. I can't walk anywhere that I know my feet will get wet. Especially when I have on socks; that makes it worse.

3. Ha haa... when I asked Jeremy what one of my quirks were he said, "You stay up too late." and I was like, "Is that a quirk?" So, I guess I will put that on here too. It has been one of our challenges. He is wayyyy too chipper in the morning for me and wants to talk and have conversations and I can barely muster up enough energy to look at him. Sometimes I just don't respond because I don't have it in me to do so. But on the opposite side, that is what I'm like with him at night time. He is an old man and wants to go to bed at 9 or 10 every night. Ugh! That's when I start to livin' up.

4. I don't like to wear socks to bed and don't like my feet covered unless they are really, really cold. I like to have my feet hang out of the covers. And, I hate having my nose and mouth covered while I sleep. It makes me feel clausterphobic. Sometimes if my feet are covered I feel like that too.

5. I have weird food cycles where I'll eat the same thing every day for a few months and never get sick of it and then one day I will decide I'm done with it and never eat it again for a few years because I've worn it out.

6. I have been told that I talk with my hands a lot when I tell stories and have really dramatic facial expressions and talk loud. Here's a picture of me that my friends laughed at, cause it was taken of me telling a story at FHE about a year ago in the ol' singles ward.


I tag Angie Terburg, Sara Sabey, Shanda Lister, Holly Lybrook, Laura Powell, Heather Williams.

Baby Beanies!

I made these cute beanies for our baby (minus the pink one... I made that one for my friend Jenya that is having a little girl).

Aren't they so stinkin' cute! I had Frank model one of them tonight. lol

Same Sex Marriage

Jeremy and I had a conversation about this one day and both of us are not in favor of it, however, neither one of us cared if people had the right to be married as a 'same sex marriage' because we believe that this is a free right given for living in America. However, after watching this video (about 7 minutes) I've kind of changed my mind.

If you have 7 minutes to watch it, let me know what you think. I would love to hear some of your point of views.

Day of the Baby Shower

What a great day! I have never been so excited for any party (including my Bridal Shower) than I have been for the Baby Shower. It's because this is all so new for me and it's stuff I have never ventured to purchase before, so I don't have anything yet. I couldn't wait to see what I got and put it all in the baby's room. It has been KILLING me not to get anything yet and to be patient for the shower. lol Those of you who know me understand this about me. :)

I must also give a HUGE THANK YOU to my mom, Angie, Evelyn (and her 2 girls: Courtney & Maree), Jenya, Amanda and Lona for organizing, planning, buying, preparing food, decorating, etc. etc. I know how much work it is and truly appreciate it. Also a BIG THANK YOU to my dad for scanning tons of pictures of Jeremy and I and making a Baby Shower DVD in 48 hrs to show in the theatre room at the club house. It was a big hit and I appreciate the time you spent putting it all together at the last second.

AND, thank you for all that came, I was actually humbled by how many of you came. We were blessed with sooo much stuff and couldn't believe everyone's generosity. We had almost 50 people attend. I have seriously been blessed with really awesome friends that will be my friends for life, and am so grateful for each of you and the friendship you've given me over the years. I truly look up to all of you and couldn't have chosen better people to cross paths with.

Now for the fun stuff... :D
Here are the cute party favors we gave out. It says, "Thank You for celebrating Tara's Bun in the Oven". Aren't they the cutest? Angie, Jenya and I stayed up making them the night before and putting frosting in little fry sauce cups.


Here are the cutest cupcakes with little turtles that Angie ordered online. They were a hit with the kids. All the kids wanted to collect them.

See those orange pumpkins in the corner? They are SOUP BOWLS! My friend Amanda's husband is a baker and he made pumpking soup bowls for the potato white cheddar soup we served. Evvy brought all the yummy toppings and Angie brought some fresh cut chives out of her garden. Yum!

Evvy and Courtney slaving away in the kitchen.


Sadly we didn't take too many pic's of people there. :( But, I hope you get the jist of it. We had a movie playing in the theatre room of our engagement & bridal pics, wedding videos, growing up pics of Jeremy & I and our maternity pics. We had raffles and gave away Mary Kay make-up and yummy lotions and everyone wrote on diapers with their kid advice that Jeremy and I can read while we change our baby's bum. :) ha haa There was lots of good food including Lona's famous pasta salads, my fav!!

Presents, Presents and more Presents







The Baby's Room with our new presents in it:

The Baby Is Getting Closer To Coming

Kiss It Good-bye Sista!

April 2008:

So tonight we went and took some maternity pictures as a couple. I saw all these really cute pictures online and wanted some for myself. Ughh... but, I must remember, I don't LOOK like the ones I saw online. Although I'm not keen on pictures of myself right now, I know I'll regret it if I don't get them done. It's funny how you can change soooo much in just a few short months. Is there seriously 2 whole months left?

October 2008:

I had my dad take these pictures for my upcoming baby shower this Saturday, so I won't post all of the maternity pictures until after the shower.

When Matt came home tonight (Yes, Matt still lives with us) I was showing him our pictures and he said, "Tara, you're so pretty!" I wanted to give him the biggest hug ever and almost teared up (remember... "emotional"). "Pretty" is not how I feel and I'm definitely out of my realm of being comfortable with my appearance (chanting "it's temporary" over and over again in my head). I need to kick my butt in the gym after this pregnancy.

Out With the In-Laws

Today was fun. I got to hang out with my in-laws and go shopping for baby stuff. Lona and I went to BabiesRUs and got a stroller/infant car seat and high chair. Plus my mom's in-laws gave us money to get something else we needed and we got a car seat for when the baby gets a little bit bigger. We will have all of them set up in the baby's room to display for the baby shower.

After a day of shopping I went out to eat with Lona and Tom and Uncle Bob for Chinese. Thanks for the fun day! It was good spending some time with you and chatting the day away. :)

Baby Shower

Open House
Baby Boy Shower

For
Tara Green

When: Saturday, October 11, 2008
Where: Tara Green's
Pemberley Club House
1567 West 110 North
Pleasant Grove, UT

Park in designated parking spots
or on "Proctor Lane Rd" in front of the complex, otherwise you will be towed.

Time: 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Luncheon Served

Baby room colors –
Green, Blue and Brown

Given by: Colette, Evelyn,
Angie, Amanda and Lona

R.S.V.P.:
Colette
cocobear234@yahoo.com

Registered @ BabiesRUS (www.babiesrus.com) and Target (www.target.com)

Armstrong Mansion

This weekend Jeremy and I got to stay at the Armstrong Mansion (B&B) for a night. We got a free room there when we bought our TimeShare in January of this year and are just getting around to using our free stay. They registered us for the smallest room on a Sunday night ("Sunday" and "Small" of course, cause it was free). I asked Jeremy if he wanted to upgrade and he said 'no'... until we got there and saw the room. But luckily since it wasn't busy they upgraded us to one of their largest rooms at no extra charge. And they brought us an amazing little gift basket of Martinelli's, homemade fudge, popcorn and soda with banana splits.

I asked about the history of the mansion and it was built in 1860 as a wedding present for this "Armstrong" guy's wife. I LOVED how old everything was and they did such a good job at preserving the time it was built. I kind of felt like we were living in a Stephen King movie. I told Jeremy if we opened the door and 2 twin boys were standing outside of our room saying "redrum", then we were outta there. lol

Here is the web address for them to check it out, but I must say, their website and advertising doesn't do them justice. (www.armstrongmansion.com) I would've never stayed here just looking at their site and am glad we won a free stay to experience it.

We were first shacked up in the July room and switched to the February room on the 3rd floor. We walked around and looked at all the rooms and this one was the coolest. It was huge and had a iron rod, spiral stair case in the room that went up to this huge jetted tub that looked out on to the streets of SLC. I kept looking up at that stair case from the bed in the dark waiting for a small light to start floating down the stairs and for me to get freaked out. ha ha






The Haunting of Marsten Manor

Anyway... after we chose our room, the inn keeper told us that a scary movie had been filmed there and was about to hit the stores (WalMart) next month. It didn't get the best reviews, as you can see from the link (http://www.deseretnews.com/movies/review/1,5208,450000878,00.html), but it was cool cause most of the scary parts of the movie were filmed in our bedroom. The acting in the movie was bad and the story line wasn't too great, but it made for a fun night watching the movie with our little gift basket and being a little freaked out that there were ghosts in our room in the movie.

All in all, I would recommend the B&B to anyone. We had a really fun time. If you get to stay there, I would recommend watching the movie while you're there.

General Conference Thoughts

I just wanted to write a quick note about conference. I guess since we've been working so hard on all of our spiritual goals, we've anticipated conference more than usual. Plus with the economy crashing right now, we were curious to see what the authorities had to say about everything.

I will just write a couple of things that stand out in my mind the most, but I thought it was interesting that they said, "Faith is a CHOICE" and that "Losing Hope" was a temptation of the advesary. It was an interesting choice of verbiage that stood out to me, especially with my earlier post about 'faith'.

I also noticed that they stressed families, temples and being prepared with our "needs". Overall conference was wonderful and we are so grateful to have prophets and leaders on this earth today to be a guiding force to eternal happiness.