new years resolutions...

okay, i don't ever do new years resolutions, but since everyone else who has a blog has done some... i guess i'll think of a few ways i could improve myself... but that's almost impossible because i am so awesome.

1. be nicer. this week i have been a real b. sorry everybody! blame it on allstate they are stressing me out!

2. make more interesting dinners. i cook all the time, but i wish i was more creative culinarily. so far i've made roast chicken, spaghetti and meatballs and chicken rice casserole this week... so i am not doing great at this. but, i did find a recipe for tempura that looks pretty good...

3. watch less bravo and e! (i doubt i'll be able to give this up... well, until gg is back)

4. be more social. everyone who is reading this that lives in wisconsin, come on over! i'm serious.

5. finish some of my craft projects that i started in 2009, hey, even 2008. remember the cathedral quilt? the mother's day wreath?

6. speaking of #5, decorate for more holidays than just christmas. i love decorations, i just hate cleaning up afterward.

7. read more. i want to read at least 3 real books a month. so far i'm almost done with one, so i guess i'll have to pick shorter books this month.

8. be more grateful.

9. go to the temple more.

10. don't complain so much. i know what you're thinking... what? ali? complain? i know i know. it's a bad habit. but i'm going to work on it!

11. do my hair and make-up better and more often. it's hard when you wear your hair up to work 3/5 days, you know?

anyways, that's all i can think of for now. i'm sure my husband will be able to come up with more for me. also... i want to be as skinny as i was in this picture this year. happy new year!

christmas break

one of my life goals is to never have a job where i don't get winter break... so far things have been working out. this christmas was the best! it finally felt like christmas at our house again. and i of course do not have any pictures... i asked andie to email me some to spruce up this post... but she's slacking.

so... if you never see that picture of andie wearing a santa mask standing in front of my grandma's christmas tree next to her bf or cute pictures of baby opening presents or harriet tanning or us in las vegas loving it... blame her!

moving on.

we got to california at about 5am christmas eve... due to a 6 (or was it 8?) hour delay at the milwaukee airport. it was okay... airports have...... chairs. then it was not stop partying. we had the annual christmas eve bash with the bobergs, then christmas morning with mom, hanging out, visiting grandma and grandpa nielsen, grandma alice, then christmas dinner at grandma mary's with the tobiassens. then the next day we celebrating my mom's bday a few days late by heading to crate and barrel super early to score sweet deals and ornaments... we walked out of there with a few large bags full of merch. then we bought more online. then we went out to lunch with the prescotts. too bad our waitress at luicilles was the worst! then the next day was church. then we took typod to the check on some english bullies at fashion island and do a little post-christmas shopping. we also went to the coolest pei wei there ever was! and it was free because i found an old pei wei gift card with the exact amount of money to cover mine, david's and tyler's meals. it was a christmas miracle!

this is tyler with the coolest soda machine! i felt like i was in tokyo!

it was all touch screen and you could pick any kind of soda with any kind of flavor and it mixed your drink automatically. we had to sample several concoctions... you can imaging what an 11 year would come up with--especially when his drink of choice is a suicide.

we spent a lot of time with the fam. david 1 threw an excellent taco night at mom's house and hosted one of the best new year's parties to date. we made pizza's in his pizza oven and it was warm enough to hang out outside. then we kicked the adults out and watched angels and demons, my brother and i were the only ones to stay awake during the whole movie. the next day we headed to utah with a little detour in vegas with the girlies. am i dreaming or do you have my gameboy?

we went to serrendipity and did a little shopping. then we got to provs and had the time of our lives. we got to go to jenna's sealing saturday morning. it was great and so wonderful to catch up with our favorite farrells and to see all of david's siblings. and the lotts!!

we managed to see all of our nieces and nephews this holiday season. we loved it! thanks drew, clark and ty for letting us play games with you! also thanks to the dry cleaners next to the cafe rio in provo for staying open late and cleaning my coat! i don't know how i got so much cake on it at the reception.

then sunday morning (really early) we headed back to milwaukee.

anyways, christmas was the bomb! we had so much fun with everyone in california and utah. can't wait to see everyone next christmas!!

it's christmas time

christmas in wisconsin is a terrible song... you should look it up. you might throw up. but, it's a great time of year. since we live out here, we thought we should really experience a winter christmas, so on the first day it started snowing we drove out to a christmas tree farm in west allis to chop down our own tree.

it was freezing so we picked a tree really fast and david cut it down.

i also got an early christmas present! these are my favorite kind of ornaments and my favorite christmas story. i love them!
then we decorated the tree. i think it looks pretty good. i can't wait until we have a bigger place so we can get a bigger tree and get even more awesome ornaments. you can't see the garland that well in this pic, but you can see it in real life. over thanksgiving my mom got me this cool antique garland with crystals on it... so sparkly and christamsy. thanks mom!

i'm still working on the christmas tree skirt. i'm half way done, but of course i found a bucilla pattern that i love, so i'll probably make a better one next year!

thanksgiving... i mean amber's birthday weekend

i don't have any pictures of actual thanksgiving, because, let's face it we were really just celebrating ambie's birthday all weekend.

ambie had an awesome 19th bday on black friday. we kicked off the day by a little surprise blueberry muffin breakfast... sorry it wasn't really muffins amber, andie told us you had a muffin tin. she didn't tell us she hid it under the oven. then she got the best present ever:

(in case you can't enlarge that, it's a kitty pillow)

then we went shopping all day and ate way too much, but fuddruckers was an excellent bday dinner choice. renee was the best roommate by bringing a dq cake into the restaurant.

tyler was way happy to be shopping.

until he found out he would have to sit in the trunk with our shopping bags.

then we ate some more. tepanyaki was not as good as kobe, but it was still fun.

hey brothers.
rj and andelish and mom. loving every second of it!
and that is the only picture i have of baby! so sad. andie and amber: email me the rest of the pics!
then we played great dalmuti too much...

andie was not happy with what david was playing.

and that was the weekend. eating too much and hanging with all of my favorites.

medical school is so boring

well, medical school isn't boring for david, but i'm dying! at least i like doing domestic things and am bored enough to think of projects to keep me busy. this thanksgiving i'm going to be most grateful for the internet!

while browsing the web a while ago i found a tutorial on how to make a cathedral window quilt... it didn't look very hard, so i though why not? muslin was on sale and i had time on my hands. i started cutting out the squares and ironing them into origami shapes and stitching them together, hours and hours and hours later i have part of a square done. i think it looks pretty cute, but it takes too long, so this will probably end up just being crib sized.

a few weeks ago i was browsing martha's website and came across some super cute carmel apples, so i called up the yan's and we dipped some apples. i think they turned out delicious!

i also had a crazy idea to make a fall wreath out of real fall leaves so i made david go on a few walks with me around our neighborhood and down by a stream near our house. we collected a ton of great leaves and i tried a few preservation techniques... don't believe the internet, glycerin gel does not work! i ended up with a bunch of moldy leaves, ironing with wax paper worked the best for me. the wreath has been up about 6 weeks and hasn't crumbled yet!

so, that's what i've been up to while david studies. pretty boring, but i have found some shows that you cannot miss: modern family, glee (sometimes), gg (as always) and 30 rock (it only took me a week to watch all of the seasons, it's a good thing we finished before test week)

so between the crafting and the baking i've filled my evenings. i'm looking forward to thanksgiving and being able to hang out with all of my readers (andie, mom, laura and stephanie). that's all i can think of to blog about. now that i finally have my camera charger back i'll be able to blog more frequently. isn't a blog without pictures so boring!?

new le crueset

my mom is going to be the only who cares... feel free to skip this one... the next one is better anyways.

so when my mom was in town we went to the le crueset outlet they have near us and picked up these little french onion soup dishes, which just so happen to be the perfect size for making individual pot pies, which we enjoyed for dinner tonight.

just another view of the handled bowls.

she also bought me this beautiful new heart shaped enameled cast iron that i made spinach artichoke dip in.  funny story, i registered for this for my wedding last year and grandma nielsen got it for me, but turns out it was sold out... but i found it in wisconsin!

thanks for all of the le crueset mom!  you're the best!  we can't wait until you come back so we can make delicious treats in these!

memorial day weekend!

for memorial day weekend we had two visitors... tyler our best house guest and my mom.  we had so much fun, even though it was the weekend before david's first test week.  we kicked off the weekend by heading to the brewers/giants game.  it was fun, but mom was done by about the fourth inning.  so we headed to the fan shop and typod got all the brewers gear he could handle.

after the game we headed to gilles' frozen custard for dessert... we converted my mom and tyler to frozen custard. 

on saturday we went down to chicago to go shopping and eat at giordano's.  i finally got to try a real chicago italian roast beef sandwich... it was delicious.

then we did a little more shopping and decided to visit the sear's tower, which is now called something else, but no one remembers it's new name.  

it's tall.
we got in line to get tickets and found out the line was like 2.5 hours long... so mom decided it would be worth an extra $15 a piece to cut to the front of the line.

a 60 sec. elevator ride later we were 103 stories up.  they have these little plexiglass alcoves that you can stand in.  it's pretty scary.

these pictures look weird because of all the reflected light off of the glass.

doesn't look that safe.

see: you can see all the way down to the street!

mom was freaking out... she had a death grip on several strangers... so funny!
anyways, our weekend was so fun!  we love it when people come to visit.  everyone has the best time with us too!  ;)

despite having visitors during prime study time david did awesome on his exams.  medical school is going to be a breeze.