Daniel Tosh & More Giants

If you haven't guessed by now, I love the San Francisco Giants. Last season, I'm pretty sure my good friend, Katie, and I went to about 20 games. We both decided this year we needed to tone it down and save some money, but that doesn't mean I can't go to games still!

Last weekend Tomas got 4 tickets to the game through his company and invited us to go! Brenda joined us and we had a fun-filled Saturday.

It started off with going to the Giants game. I know most people hate being in the last row of a stadium, but I love love love being in Row 18 at Giants games (as long as we are not in Sections 327 - 334). You seriously have some of the most amazing view from the last row, not to mention you can get up and stretch whenever you want.

Unfortunately I'm on a losing streak when going to games lately, but we still enjoyed ourselves at the game!

 Sorry for the terrible lighting! I figured you can see our faces enough though :-)

After the game we all headed back to our place in Alameda and got ready to see DANIEL TOSH! Branden and I love watching Tosh.O and when we discovered he was coming to do stand-up in San Francisco we knew we had to go.

We left a little later then we wanted and had to scratch our dinner plans. We wanted to try a restaurant called Ricky Bobby but we didn't have time to wait to be seated. We ended up at this Chinese restaurant in Lower Haight called Wonderland and it ended up being delicious!

After dinner we headed to the Nourse Theater to watch Daniel. He was HILARIOUS! If love his show then you will love his stand-up even more. His opener was great and Daniel performed for almost 2 hours. You could tell his set wasn't memorized and he was coming up with a lot on the fly. It made it so much better.

I highly recommend going if he ever comes to your area! And it is 100% worth the ticket price.

Here are a few pictures from the evening.

My 4th of July Recipes

If you saw my last post from camping, I mentioned I made a 4th of July Firecracker Cake and some patriotic Jello shots. Both of them tasted amazing and I figured I'd share the recipes.

Firecracker Cake

Ingredients:

- 1 box Betty Crocker SuperMoist white cake mix
- Water (called for on cake mix box)
- Vegetable oil (called for on cake mix box)
3 egg whites (called for on cake mix box, I used liquid egg whites because I'm lazy)
- Red food color
- Blue food color
- 1 container (12 oz) Betty Crocker Whipped fluffy white frosting

Here is a picture of the ingredients I used. You can also see one of our awesome wedding gifts above the oven.

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 325^oF. Generously grease 12-cup fluted tube cake pan. Make cake batter as directed on box, using water, oil, and egg whites.

2. Pour 1 cup of the batter into a small bowl; stir in red food color until well mixed (I used about 30 drops of food coloring, but looking back I wish I used more). Pour another cup of the batter into a separate bowl; stir in blue food color until well mixed (again I used about 30 drops of food coloring but wish I had used more).

3. Pour red cake batter into bottom of pan. Carefully pour remaining white batter over red batter in pan. Carefully pour blue batter over white batter (blue batter does not need to cover white batter completely; it looks better if it just forms a ring in the center of the white batter).

4. Bake as directed on box or until toothpick inserted near center comes out clean. Cook cake 5 minutes. Meanwhile, place cooling rack over cookie sheet. Turn pan upside down onto cooling rack. Cool cake completely, about 30 minutes.

5. When cake is cool, divide frosting evenly into 3 microwavable bowls. Microwave 1 bowl of frosting uncovered on high a few seconds (I microwaved for 10 seconds, mixed, and put it back in for 5 more seconds) until smooth enough to drizzle over cake. With spoon, drizzle all of white frosting back and forth around cake in a striping pattern.

6. Repeat microwaving second bowl of frosting until smooth. Stir in a few drops blue food coloring until well blended. Drizzle over cake, scattering frosting back and forth.

7. Repeat with remaining bowl of frosting and red food color, making sure red, white, and blue frosting can be seen on cake. Let cake stand at room temperature until frosting is set before serving.

Everyone said the cake tasted delicious and I loved how it turned out once we cut into it as well :-)

Jello Shots

Ingredients:

- 1 cup boiling water, divided

- 1 package (3 oz.) JELL-O Berry Blue Flavor Gelatin

- 1 package (3 oz.) JELL-O Strawberry Flavor Gelatin

- 1 envelope KNOX Unflavored Gelatin

- 1 cup milk, divided

- 3 Tbsp. sugar

- 1/2 tsp. vanilla

- 1/2 cup Vodka, divided (we used whipped cream vodka)

Directions:

1. Add 1/2 cup boiling water and 1/4 cup vodka to berry gelatin mix in small bowl; stir 2 min until completely dissolved. Repeat with strawberry gelatin mix. Cool.
2. Meanwhile, sprinkle unflavored gelatin over 1/4 cup milk in medium bowl; let stand 5 min. Bring remaining milk to a boil in saucepan (be careful because milk can burn easily).
3. Remove from heat; stir in sugar and vanilla. Add to plain gelatin mixture; stir until gelatin is completely dissolved. Cool 10 min.
4. Spoon berry gelatin into 20 (1-oz or 2-oz) plastic shot glasses sprayed lightly with cooking spray, adding about 2 tsp. to each. Refrigerate 15 min. or until set but not firm.
5. Top with unflavored gelatin mixture, adding about 2 tsp. to each cup. Refrigerate 10 min.
6. Cover with strawberry gelatin, adding about 2 tsp. to each cup. Refrigerate 2 hours or until firm.

This was our finished product! I accidentally bought 4-oz shot glasses at the store because I wasn't paying enough attention, but I know they would look much better in the proper size!

And there you have it! Both of these recipes were fairly simple and are both adorable for the 4th of July of any other patriotic holiday. I can't wait to tackle my next holiday-themed recipe.

Our First "Adult" Camping Trip

Branden and I have been camping together a few times, and I've been camping with groups of friends before, but this was the first time we had a group going that WE were in charge of planning. It really made me feel like an adult. We no longer had our parents to plan the meals and buy all the food!

Preparation began a month in advance with the meal planning and logistics of trying to figure out when everyone would be heading to the campsite. Branden and I also had to figure out how we were going to hit everything into my Honda Accord. Since we were able to switch cars in Sacramento to my mom's Tahoe, Branden came up with the brilliant plan to bring a few of our camping bins to Sacramento a few weeks early so we wouldn't have to worry. Even then, my car was jam packed on Thursday morning, and Branden and Tomas had an uncomfortable 2 hour car ride.

The night before we left, I prepared an amazing 4th of July firecracker cake as well as some 4th of July themed Jello shots (which were delicious by the way). I'll write the recipes in another post. Here are some pictures of the end products.

 I bought the wrong size dixie cups which is why they look so empty!

On Thursday morning, while Branden was in class, Tomas and I got the car ready!

Once Branden was back from class, we were off and ready to head to Sacramento to switch cars and then head up to Donner Lake!

When we made it to Donner Lake we unpacked the car and set up our tents and decorations! We got so lucky because the entire trip there was nobody at the campsite next to us.

Most of the group arrived on Thursday afternoon and Tyler and Julie arrived around 1am on Thursday night/Friday morning.

 Branden and I with our nerdy but amazingly useful headlamps

Most of the group pulled an all nighter on Thursday night (I was not one of them) and so Friday morning I was left alone to enjoy tehe wilderness and do some reading.

Once everyone woke up, we cooked up some required 4th of July hot dogs and brats and then hung out at the campsite all day.

We made some amazing spaghetti and meatballs for dinner and ate the cake I made along with some homemade ice cream! My mom bought us this ice cream ball for Christmas and we figured it was the perfect time to use it. Almost everyone had a turn shaking the ball.

 

While we were making our ice cream, Julie found a little ducking right behind our tent. The little guy wouldn't stop following her. We kept the duck around until the next morning when the park rangers came to try and find it's mother. They told us later they were unable to find it's mother but would take it to a refuge where the duck would grow to an adult and be released.

At night we walked to Donner Lake to watch the fireworks. It was a great show that lasted 20 minutes with an awesome grand finale. Sorry for the blurry pics here.

We had tons of fun hanging out around the campfire every night.

 We made banana boats one night and s'mores another night.

On Saturday morning we had some of the best breakfast burritos (compliments of Branden) and then headed to the lake for some fun in the water.

After the lake we came back to camp and hung out for the rest of the evening.

 Brenda's dart landed on the handle of the ax that was on the tree.

We had such an amazing time with great friends and can't wait to do it again soon!