Panthers Vs The Niners

We got to see Andy play together this past weekend when the Niners came to North Carolina to take on the Panthers.  Not only did we get to see Andy play...we got to spend time with some of our favorite families!
The Londrys, The Lippards and The Lees!  (Rachel and Rebecca-we missed yall terribly!)

We had a great time drinking mimosas, snacking on Lillians "snake" bread, brownies and chicken salad and catching up with each other.  Here are two of my favorite "Dad's", Paul and George.

Here is me with the girls- Me, Katie, Lillian, and Stefanie.

 These girls were sporting some cute Niner gear!

As you can tell by our crowd there was a mixture of Panther and Niner fans....but we were all cheering for Andy to play well!  I was also excited to see Manny play again...he actually saw me before the game waving like the crazy fan I am and he smiled and gave me the 2 finger salute:)

Our seats were right behind the 49ers bench so I got a lot of pictures of the team and some good ones of Andy kicking!

In the end the Panthers won, it was a great game...but we were still sad...

We cheered up when we got to see Andy and say goodbye before he left for London!

In order to get in a picture with Andy, we made Ryan cover up his Panther logo on his shirt:)

After we said bye to Andy we ran into Patrick Willis and he was nice enough to chat with the guys and let the girls get pictures!  What a nice guy!

Andy we are so glad we got to see you play in NC!  Good luck in London, we will be watching and cheering on the Niners on Sunday!!

Jennifer's Baby Shower

This weekend we got to celebrate Jennifer and Brian's soon-to-be little pumpkin.  This time of year is perfect for a baby shower for Jennifer because she loves fall and anything pumpkin flavored.   Here is the Mommy-to-be and the hostesses: Alice, Leslie, Jennifer, Me and Caroline.

We used the baby's monogram, WMC,  throughout the party.  Between the four of the us, we had lots of creative food and decorations!  I made my water bottles, and we also had hot apple cider and lemonade to drink.

Yummy food!

Cupcakes for dessert!

Mums for the beautiful fall centerpiece.

Jennifer got lots of presents including her diaper bag, monitor, clothes, and personalized picture frames.

 We had so much fun catching up with college friends and seeing their little ones!

Before everyone left they got a jar of my homemade pumpkin butter.  In order to make enough for the entire shower I had two huge pots of it going on the stove last week...my house smelled so good the rest of the day!

This shower really was so much fun to plan and prepare for.  Not only did we have a great theme/time of year for a shower, but it was for such a sweet friend.  Jennifer I can't wait to meet your little pumpkin and I know you will be such a great mom!

Asian Night

Recently we have been back and forth to the DMV tag office by our house trying to get my new car registered so I can drive again!  The DMV happens to be located next to an Asian Market, so Ryan and I decided to actually go in and make an entire meal out of ingredients we bought at the Market that day. 

Once you get over the smell in this place, it is actually really neat. (I love the guy in this picture....who knows what he thought about some crazy girl taking pictures inside his grocery store!)

They sell rice in bags as big as our dogs food.

They have an entire aisle for soy sauce...

Their selection of fresh live fish is pretty impressive.  We stood and watched cute Asian men ordering fish for a while...very entertaining to watch the workers reach their hands in these tanks, slam the fish on the counter and get him ready to take home for dinner...

So at this point in our shopping trip I think I was embarrassing Ryan by all my picture taking...until we saw this and Ryan insisted I get a picture.  Yuck!

Ok so on to what we bought and ended up making.  We decided to make spring rolls for an appetizer and chow mein for the main course with sake to wash it all down!   The only things we didn't buy from the Asian market was the cabbage and the pork (we couldn't tell what was chicken, pork, veal...so we thought it best to take a trip to Whole Foods before heading home!)
We found a baked Spring Roll recipe here.

Ryan cooked the meat while I combined the other ingredients.

Then we were ready to assemble...well after we watch several You Tube videos of how to roll the spring roll of course!

While these baked we made a quick dipping sauce, warmed up some Sake and researched how to make beginners chop sticks for me:)

These were soooo good!

After we finished them we both wanted to make another round!  But on to the main course,  Chicken Chow Mein.  We used this recipe, but ommited the noodles that were on top.  For the rice we decided to cheat a little bit, since the dinner was already involved, and used instant rice.

The Chow Mein was super easy and did not dissapoint!

I had so much fun on our Asian Date night and hope we can make those spring rolls again soon!