Deep Dish Pizza!

Though our schedules have been incredibly hectic lately, I FINALLY got around to trying my hand at a deep dish pizza. I bought the deep dish pan over a year ago and finally used it for the first time a few weeks ago. There is no Chicago style deep dish pizza to be found in our area and I really miss it! So, I thought, "Why not make my own?". It's not quite Gino's quality, but it was good and a huge hit with our guests! You do need a special deep dish pizza pan (though I suppose 2 small round cake pans might work). I have the 14-inch Chicago Metallic Professional Deep Dish Pizza Pan and have had success with it both times I used it.


The recipe I have is for 2 12-inch pizzas. Since my pan is 14 inches, I have to use a little over half the dough and a little over half the sauce (or all of it for a saucy pizza), which leaves me with an odd amount of dough left and sometimes a little sauce. I have thrown the extra dough in the freezer and plan to take it out someday to make either a regular pizza, stromboli, or calzones. I can't say that any of these will work for sure (since the dough for deep dish pizza is a little different than regular pizza dough), but I can't imagine that it wouldn't!

If any of you want to try this fun meal (I guarantee your guests will love it!), I will try and post my recipe soon. In the meantime, you can just drool over these pictures. :)

So busy

No, we have not fallen off the planet. Yes, we (especially Heidi) are busier than we've ever been and literally have no time to do anything other than work, study, sleep, and eat.
Noel's in the midst of finals week, which always makes for a crazy week. He sits at his computer typing all day, everyday for a week straight. At the end, he turns in a big paper.
Heidi's taking Microbiology and Chemistry (General, Organic, and Biochemistry) at Pasadena City College. These classes would be difficult enough if it's all I was doing! But, on top of it, I'm working full-time. Also, we're trying to finish out the year strong as community coordinators. Our last day is May 31, which can't come soon enough at this point!
We're tired, but doing well. Just thought we'd give you all a little (albeit boring) update.

Baking Extravaganza/Valentine's Day

I had an urge to bake a lot over the past couple weeks and decided to bake several different items and create plates of treats for most of our neighbors. I made peanut butter jelly thumbprints, jam sandwich cookies (with cut-out heart middles), oatmeal pecan chocolate chip cookies, honey ginger bites, red velvet cupcakes, and sugar cookie hearts with pink frosting. It was so fun, but I ended up completely exhausted at the end of the weekend. It turned out to be a great way to connect with our some of our neighbors that we haven't seen in awhile. People loved the Valentine treats!

We were able to make 18 plates for neighbors. There were 11 apartments that didn't get any; we'll just have to catch them next time!

We had 2 other couples over for dinner on Valentine's Day and had a great time. We've been getting together about once a month with 2 of my former Fuller financial aid coworkers and their husbands. We always have lots of fun and lots of good food! We hosted this time and I tried to do a Valentine's themed meal. I made tomato soup and piped a heart in the top with some creme fraiche. Pretty cute, huh? We had paninis with red, white and purple toppings and red velvet cupcakes for dessert. It was a really fun meal to plan and execute.

Shannon and Kevin have a 1 and 1/2 year old, Miles. He is a riot and we love hanging out with him. Michelle is taunting him with Elmo in the background.

We're thankful to be surrounded with good friends who we have so much fun with!

On another note, I start school again tomorrow and am anticipating a very busy schedule if I get into both of my classes. I'm currently on the wait list for both, but REALLY hope to get in since that would complete my prereqs and enable me to start my master's in June. Please pray for some openings in the schedule or for some students to not show up on the first day!

Yay!

Just wanted to let you all know that it stopped raining! The sun has been out for 3 days and I LOVE it. I didn't realize how much I value being able to go outside almost anytime I want until it rained for 4 and 1/2 days straight...that's right, no breaks. It was crazy. I didn't even set one foot outside our door for 2 and 1/2 days. I nearly went stir crazy and finally ventured out to the mall.

Anyway, life is good again for now. More rain is expected this week though. Ugh.

Sad/Happy

Many of you have been following our progress on the home buying program we were approved for through Heritage Housing Partners and the City of Pasadena. Sadly, as of this week, Heidi and I have opted out of the program. It just did not seem like the right time to make this type of investment; we wanted to stay more financially nimble in case God calls us somewhere else in the next couple years. The program was structured with strict resale restrictions, since they would have been helping us buy a house at far below market value. Instead of investing our money in a program that could leave us unnecessarily tied down in the future, we have decided to save our money for another time and place. Here is a picture of us with the uncashed check we had written to reserve our spot in the program, which they returned to us this week after we opted out.


However, we made another purchase this week that made us happy. Our Christmas gift to each other this year was a new TV. The original idea was that we would move into our new house in December and that the TV would go above the mantle. The new idea is that the TV is a consolation for not moving. Either way, it's pretty cool. I even like watching the morning traffic report on it!

So that's our sad/happy news for this week. No new house, but a new HD viewing experience, which is kind of like cheap remodeling for the space we currently have.

"Recent" adventure

Noel attended the Annual Meeting for the Academy of Homiletics at the beginning of December. It was held in Washington D.C, so I decided to go with and visit Uncle Kevin and Aunt Karen in Maryland. After we made our plans to go, Becky and Bryant moved to Maryland and we were able to see them as well! It was a fantastic trip. We enjoyed good food and fellowship with friends and family and even got to witness an unusual Maryland snow storm!

Kevin and Karen have a beautiful home on a beautiful piece of property. We enjoyed seeing their house, their animals and their beautiful yard!

We were so excited to take this picture for Grandma's annual Christmas letter, but our submission was too late. Oh well, maybe next year!

Becky and I wandered around downtown D.C for an afternoon and just happened to see the lighting of the Christmas tree at the White House! We knew it was happening the evening we were in town, but had no idea when. Shortly after we walked up, the tree was lit! It was far away, but still beautiful and very exciting.

Time

No we have not fallen off the planet.
Yes we do have things to blog about.
No we do not have any time lately.
Yes we will try and get up to date on this soon.