Los Colores!

I must say, Indiana has its treasures and the list is gradually growing to more than just 'Mark Pfeil' as reasons to live here ;o)

Fall "colors" is a new thing for me. Fall in New Mexico is one color: gold (aka yellowish brown). And as all the tress in the Rio Grand corridor are the same (cotton woods) they all turn at the same time. They may be gold for a week and then fall off brown, or they may just turn brown and fall off -depending on how fast the cold sets in. Fall has always been my favorite season. I love the golden leaves that glitter in the wind. I love the satisfying cruch leaves make when you jump on them in the gutter. I love the crisp scent of the air growing cold, and especially, especially I love the smell of roasting green chiles. Mmmmm... they may make your eyes sting, but that smells means fall is here :o)

This year was my first fall away from the southwest, and, I will admit, I did miss the smell of roasting chilies--AND hot air ballons--BUT! Driving through the Indiana countryside at the beginning of fall break, I was awestruck with the majesty of mother natures color pallet. Simply breathtaking. Aaaand, in Indiana, Mother nature takes her time painting the world for fall :o)

She being with a few trees, turning them into what I like to call the 'fuji apple' trees, lightly dusting the edges with a mottled redish orange:

then, she fills in the middle:
then its almost as if once started, mother nature goes into a frenzy and paints everything at once! reds! and yellows! and oranges! and browns! and burgundies! and every combination in between :-D


The campus was aflame with the splendor of fall!

Leaf texture! Individual leaves are even striated! One of my favorites is the fire bush which turns a deep rich red color :o)


Leaf group colors!:


Leaf Sillouettes. I love the way the trees look with the sun backlight, they just glow!:



What a delicious feast of colors for fall, and how blessed Mark and I were to share it with each other :o) We hope you enjoyed it too!

Nani's Wedding!

Iwalani Marie Evans was sealed to Jeremy Nichols in the Albuquerque New Mexico Temple on November 1st, 2008.

WE ARE SO HAPPY FOR THEM!! :-D Mark and I were SO HAPPY to be able to be there, we flew in on Friday, Nani got married on Saturday, and we had to leave on Sunday. AND IT WAS SO WONDERFUL!!

They were married early in the morning, here are some pictures of us getting the Nan ready!


The sealing was wonderful, it is so incredible how families can grow :o) We are so happy for Nani and Remy!


I realized in retrospect that since Nani had her friend Joseph take pictures of them as a couple and I figured they would be better than MY pictures, I took very few pictures of them as a couple :o) But! Here are some pictures I did take of them outside the temple!
aaaaaww... :o)
OH MY GOODNESS!!!...THEY'RE MARRIED!!

Nani/Remy kissy pictures! :-D Kiora (or SOMEone ) actually started pulling-instead of pretend pulling as per the plan- so yes, that is genuine clinging to nani for dear life and hoping not to rip her beautiful dress.
The boys decided that they wanted jeremy to kiss nani, so they decided to push him instead of pulling him. Jeremy thought that was a pretty good idea too :o) and there is me and the NAN! Isnt she a princess?! This is my FAVORITE of the with nani picture :o) She looks so pretty and happy :o) We were laughing because I accidentally kept taking pictures of the air and nothing while we were trying to take this one, I am glad we finally got it aimed right :o)

And look at little chio! She is a princess TOO!



After a while, me and the teek got a little distracted with the picture taking and we MAY have had some fun with the flowers... AND the camera. I thought Nan would like to have these pictures too since they are fun so I am putting them up here :o)





And! There is Mark in his red tie!

WE LOVE YOU NANI AND REMY!! *MUAH!*

Halloween at Purdue!

Purdue students have this thing about dressing up. I think it has to do with "breakfast club," but for whatever reason, Purdue students seem to have a plethora of costumes lying around that they put on for minimal excuses: its Finals week, its Midterms, its Friday, its spring time, im having a bad hairday better make the best of it. Sometimes you just have kids running from class room to class room in costumes--just becasue. Sometimes the costumes are really creative and happy, like "Happy Friday" man who wears a super hero suit and rides a scooter around telling people 'Happy Friday!' Anyway, as Halloween is a more traditional time to wear costumes there seemed to be more students on campus walking around in costumes than usual. In my Nuetronics class, for example (who would have suspected!?) :

Mr. Chicken Man with Mr. Scary Man in a Robe.

Mr. Chicken Man, Mr. Scary Man, Smurfette, Mr. Irish Man in a Kilt, and Hercules

Now we add the Phantom! to the mix!

I dont know how much Mr. Chicken Man got out of lecture that day :o)

I have NEVER seen students dress up like this for Halloween at UNM!!

Purdue. Living in the cornfields must do strange things to students.

Halloween at the Branch!

For the Branch halloween party, the YW were in charge, so Heather and I had to be there to decorate and set up (although, Heather and Alex did most of the decorating that afternoon!). Mark couldn't come to the activity because he had Airforce stuff to do, and the next day he was going to take he FE exam and needed to sleep and study. So! We had to rally our spirits :o( we missed Mark a lot thought, and I tried to sneak away as fast as possible. For the mutual activity before, the young women and us stuffed "ghosts" (little trash bags full of newspaper) and made bats and covered the "haunted house" walls with black trashbags. The haunted house was a halway that we made all black and had a smoke machine and scary music in. Emanual and Alex were the scary guys in the hallway, they were doing a pretty good job scaring people:



Here is Heather and I, partners in crime!

This is the hallway, we made it green with green tissue paper over the lights with little ghosts. The entrance to the haunted house is on the left.
There were also activities likke bobbing for apples and eating doughnuts off string and makeing popcorn hands and coloring for the kids.
Then, the kids went around from room to room asking for candy in the non-haunted house hallway. Here is heaters room that they decotrated.
Here is Alex with his candy to give out!:Here are our lovely YW!!

More YW! Here are some more pictures of the event!




It was a lot of fun, we were really sad that Mark couldnt come :o(

Violin Recital!

Our friend Amanda Baer is SUPER SUPER DUPER-EST talented and awesome in a million ways. I get a call on a Saturday in October and it is Amanda!

"Hi Amanda!"

"Hi Teandra! Hey, what are you and Mark doing?"

"Oh, well, Mark is taking his FE exam, and I'm washing dishes, and then I am going to maybe start laundry and do homework, why what's up?"

"WELL! I wanted to know if you would like to come to my violin students recital to be an audience member? Like, right now?..."

"oh! Sure!" :-D

OH GOODNESS IT WAS A LOT OF FUN! :o) I drove over and had to bring my camera. One set of students were unable to make it, so Amanda had another recital that evening for them, so only one student performed at this recital. Here are some videos and photos of Amanda, Brian, her student and his family!




This is fiddling, request of Brian, and the song is called "Orange Blossom Express" and it sounds like a train! :-D




This is Amanda's Student playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. He did a GREAT job and got to play a few more "encore" pieces :o) He played them all from memory and introduced them ane everything! Quite the young performer!



This "Sonata No. 2 Mvt.1 "Obsession" " by -Eugene Ysaye. So pretty! We were supposed to be counting the number of times the composer integrated two songs into this piece; Brian was so engrossed in counting that he forgot to turn the page :) oopsies!

It was so much fun to go to the recital and we hope to attend many more! It was great!

Little Baby! :-D

...of our friend the Castros! Kellie and Emanuel Castro had their little baby Joseph this past December, and in October I had the pleasure of making Kellie's cake for her baby shower! Sharline Queen hosted it for Kellie and it was really nice to get to spend the afternoon with her, her mother and sister, friends from the branch, and some of Kellie's friends from work. She is such a WONDERFUL person and her and Emanuel are really, really nice and we are SO excited for their growing little family!

As of yet, we have no pictures of Jospeh, (but he is pretty stinking cute). I also have no pictures of the shower, BUT! I did take pictures of cake and preparations, so that is all I can post here

It was a lemon cake with raspberry cream filling. If I were to do it again, I would just have it plain raspberry filling, no cream, since it was TOO sweet and the raspberry cream didn't set up the way I would have liked. Another thing I may try is to make a white chocolate mousse and put raspberry extract (if there IS such a thing) into the mouse, and maybe fold in some fresh or frozen raspberries for the color, that would be pretty :o)

Here is the final product!:

....awww.... :o)
I made the baby about 3 days before I made the rest of the cake so that he could dry. I wanted the blanket to dry draped over the edge of the cake, so I thought to myself, "oh! I know! I will let it dry on the PAN! that is the PERFECT exact shape of the cake!" I was so excited about my brilliant plan...until I realized that I had to MOVE the baby to comething else to cook the cake. OOPS! Doing it again I am going to cook the cake first, then let the baby dry on the pan. I had to move the baby to a different bowl, and the blanket dried with a different arclength, so when I laid him on his little perch the blanket cracked :o( But! Have no fear! The beauty of fondaynt I just balled it up and threw it in the microwave for a few seconds and viola! It was as good as new to reshape!
I am a big fan of the little rubber duckie. It made me think of my sister the teek and my nephew alex. I love the picture of him with the rubber duckie suctioned cupped to his forhead. I contemplated sticking the duckie on this babies forehead but figured the reference would be a moot point and lost on the people at the shower ;o)
look at the babies cute little cubby arm rolls! and his little pacifier! When I had to move the baby to dry, the head also fell off and the arm fell off (it was a really tramatic move for the baby) so I had to stick him back together. He was cuter the first time, his face looks pretty flat now, but i think he still looks cute :o) Toy blocks!
A little Tonka Truck!

I don't have a rolling pin, so I had to wash off and use my baking spray bottle as a rolling pin for the fondant :o) I felt pretty official. I also used one of the jam jars also to roll out the fondant (the jam jar was heavier so it was easier to roll out). I had some pretty ghetto lines in the fondant from the lid of the jam jar and the spray bottle that I had to strategically roll out. Made things more interesting :o)


I love fondant! here is my favoirite recipe I found online (http://thecookduke.com/category/cakes/birthday-cake-ideas/):

"Ingredients:

• 1 Tbsp of unflavored gelatin
• 1/4 cup of cold water
• 1 tsp of almond extract
• 1/2 cup of light corn syrup (If a corn syrup is not available, you can substitute it with a sugar syrup made with 1-1/4 cups sugar and 1/3 cup water, boiled together until syrupy)
• 1 Tbsp of glycerin (some recipes say it’s optional, believe me, it’s a must)
• 2 lbs 10X confectioners’ sugar
• 1/2 tsp of white vegetable shortening

Directions:

• Sprinkle the gelatin over cold water in a small bowl and let it rest for 2 minutes to soften
• Place the bowl in a microwave for 30 seconds on High, until the gelatin dissolves
• Add the Almond extract
• Add the corn syrup and the glycerin and stir until the mixture is smooth and clear (if the mixture is not turning smooth and clear, microwave it for an additional 15 to 20 seconds on high and stir again)
• Sift 1 1/2 pounds of the sugar into a large bowl
• Make a hole in the sugar and pour the liquid mixture to it
• Stir with a wooden spoon until the mixture becomes sticky
• Sift some of the remaining 1/2 pound of sugar onto a smooth work surface and add as much of the remaining sugar as the mixture will take
• Knead the fondant, adding a little more sugar if necessary, to form a smooth, pliable mass
• Rub the vegetable shortening on your thumbs and knead it into the fondant
• Wrap the fondant in plastic wrap and place it in a tightly sealed container to prevent it from drying out
• If the icing dries out and harden it can often be revived by popping it into a microwave oven for a few seconds and then kneading it back to life"


Here is the little baby! He has no legs under the blanket :o)










Here is a before and after shot of my kitchen (poor mark, I am SO lucky that he is so patient with me) I can make a pretty awesome mess when I put my mind to it ;o) Actually, I am pretty sure the kitchen mess factor is directionally proportional to the fun factor of the baking project :o)

I also made cupcakes for the baby shower. They are dark chocolate cupcakes with butter cream frosting:

we put them on top of little cardboard squares lined with foil and the wrapped them in plastic paper and tied it with ribbons and but little bangles on it :o) So cute!! :o)

All in all, it was really really fun and I had a great time cooking and decorating. The shower was really great and was a lot of fun. It was fun to spend time with the other ladies and Kellie's friends and help to welcome in her little baby boy!

*one final note: On the way over to kellies party I was loading everything into the car and Mark was like, "Teandra! Your pants!" yep! I had accidentally ripped the pocket of my jeans. oops! I went over to my friend Heathers house who lives by Kelli and she let me use a long sweater wrap jacket :o) Then, we drove together to the shower :o) How silly!

Mr. The Hawk

Mark and I were contemplating one day that in feeding the squirrels we were also feeding our friend Mr. The Hawk.

Mr. The Hawk is our friend that lives near Purdue Village; he circles around in the morning making hawk cries. It is pretty interesting and Mark and I like it a lot! He is a very pretty bird.

Mark was leaving to go to AFROTC one evening and told me that Mr. The Hawk was on our neighbors roof and that I should go take pictures! :-D So here he is!








Mr. The Hawk flew down onto the lawn and was walking around so I decided to take a MOVIE of him ! :-D

I was trying to solicit hawk noises from him so there is a meager "Mr. The Hawk" imitation at the beginning of this clip... enjoy!

FEEDING THE SQUIRRELS!

HOO-RAY!!! I LOVE PURDUE VILLAGE!!

Purdue Village is home to international grad students, married students, and...SQUIRRELS! and BUNNIES!! :-D it is SO great!



In the day we have squirrels, and at night the bunnies come out. :o) Me and Mark bought a few bags of raw peanuts with their shells on to feed to the squirrels :o)

It is a pretty good thing that Mark doesn't feed the squirrels like I do or else Purdue Village would be overrun by exceptionally chubby squirrels. Here are some videos of our escapades:







I loved feeding the squirrels! There was one that came back over and over and over to get a nut and then run and hide it, and get a nut, and run and hide it :o)

and who knows? Maybe because of our efforts and the forgetfulness of squirrels in re-finding their buried snacks we will have a large peanut crop in the vicinity of our apartment! :-)

Indiana Skies

Growing up in NM I was spoiled with BEAUTIFUL skies :o) I really, really REALLY love wide open skies with lots of clouds and beautiful sunsets. Indiana has its own sort of beautiful skies, and living across from the big green fields, it gives Mark and I ample opportunity to enjoy them :o)



there are definitely no mountains, but beautiful sunsets and gorgeous clouds are breathtaking however you look at them :o)

Some Purdue Students...

...have waaaaay too much time on their hands:



I have no idea what these students are studying, but for some reason, I am doubting that this particular construction project was for school credit...
it is pretty cool though :o)

They had water that went from the top level down a "water wheel spillway" thing into the moat. That ramp above is going over the moat, across a bridge that does between the Giza Sphinx arms, I am assuming to the front door. The moat is made from bails of hay that are lined with plastic to retain water.
here is the water that went from the top level down a "water wheel spillway" thing into the moat

pretty cool. I wish that we could have some of that there 'free-time' for mark and I. That would be GREAT!