Just in case you did not know already, I have decided not to blog on xanga and I am only going to blog on my blogger one because it's just too much to have to update two blogs. You can view my blogger one by going to www.megandtoddcook.blogspot.com (that is meg and todd cook, not megan and todd cook) I hope we can all stay in touch still. Have a Merry Christmas!

So it's true...I have created a new blog for myself. I just know a lot of people who are on blogger, so I decided to have one on blogger and then I will probably keep my xanga one too, since I have some family who only use xanga. You can find my new blog at www.megandtoddcook.blogspot.com You should check it out even if you mainly read my xanga blog, my new one is cute, too. So if you have an account on blogger, erase my xanga blog and replace it with the blogger one, and if you don't have a blogger account...MAKE ONE!

The day before Thanksgiving, Hogle Zoo was having a free admission day, so I thought it would be fun if Aubrey, Brittany, Chloe, and I went even though I worked all night on Tuesday night. I thought as long as I kept busy and did not think about being tired, maybe I would be okay. It was way fun though and worth the no sleep! Aub and Britt met at my apartment around 9:30am and we drove up there in my car. It was kind of cold when we first got there, but it was nice by about 11:30 or 12.

Aub really wanted her and Chloe's picture taken on the rhino, so we got a couple cute pics of that.

Even though it was chilly, it was really bright!

I thought this pic was cute. Aubrey and Chloe are giving each other a high five!

Chloe love all the animals at the zoo. She was actually a good sport about sitting in her stroller. Usually she gets sick of it after a short period, especially if I let her get out, then she usually won't get back in it.

As you can see in these two pics she isn't wearing gloves...she figured out how to get them off and then threw them! She wanted nothing to do with them!


Aubrey being silly!

Chloe had to join in on the silliness as well!

Chlo and Britt!

The zoo was decorated so cute for Christmas. They had lights and decorations every where. We will have to definitly go to their 'Zoo Lights' and see the zoo all lit up! Me and Chlo in front of the gingerbread man!

Britt, Chlo, Aub!

Here they are again!

Chloe loved walking around on her own of course! You can see Britt's legs in a running motion, well that's because she thought it would be funny to send Dallas a pic of her chasing the turkey. Aubrey got a really funny picture of it, though. It was funny to see all these people staring will Britt chased this turkey around the zoo.

After Chloe ran all around the zoo, she wouldn't get back in the stroller....go figure! So she held Britt's hand and walked to the exit. We had fun at the zoo with Aub and Britt. It was fun to get out of our apartment and do something fun!

After the zoo, we stopped at Wendy's to get some lunch, and I had an errand to run, so we said 'goodbye' and Chloe and I went to find this lady's house out in North Salt Lake. I was about ready to give up because I was so mad and honry because I couldn't find the place and her directions said to head west (the boonies--according to her) and so every time I headed west, I ended up out in the middle of nowhere and yes it was the middle of no where because there were cows just chilling on the side of the road. I felt bad because I called my dad for directions and I felt like I was driving in circles. Finally I pulled over, took a deep breath, and tried one other road, and that was it! I was excited because I had been driving for an hour and a half on this lady's confusing directions, and she wouldn't answer her phone. After we picked up what we needed from her house, it was off to the store to get the ingredients to make Yams for Thanksgiving. I got all the ingredients and went home to make them. I was so tired by the time I finally went to bed. I went to bed at 8:30pm so that I could get up at 3:30am on Thanksgiving. I had to work on Thanksgiving, so I wanted to get the Yams all made the night before, so that all I had to do with them on Thursday was throw them into the oven. I found the recipe off of www.ourbestbites.com and I wanted to try them out, and I was surprised, I thought I would have a whole pan of it left over since my family really isn't big on eating yams, but there was only about a fourth of a pan left over. Here's the recipe. They turned out quite yummy!

Candied Coconut Topped Sweet Potatoes

4 C mashed Sweet potatoes (that's a couple of the larger sized cans)
1 C Sugar*
1 cube REAL butter, softened or melted
2 eggs, beaten
1/2 can Sweetened Condensed Milk (eyeball it)
1 t vanilla

* My original recipe calls for 1 C of sugar, but many people have reported success with much less: 1/4-1/2 C. So unless you have a super sweet tooth, you may want to cut the sugar back. They're very sweet- consider yourself warned!

Topping:

(my family is going to think I'm writing this wrong, but that's because in our family we always double this part! I didn't double it in the pictures though, just to see, and it was still great, so I'll leave that up to you!)

1 C brown sugar
1 C coconut
1 cube melted real butter

Mash the sweet potatoes up with a potato masher, or spoon or whatever. Leave them a little chunky or super smooth- whatever you prefer. Mix in sugar, 1 cube butter (I usually nuke it till it's kinda melty- and yes those are technical terms) , beaten eggs, sweetened condensed milk, and vanilla. Stir until well combined and place in a 9x13 sized pan.

For the topping, combine brown sugar and coconut and then pour melted butter over and combine. Mmm...butter and sugar. You'll have a nice crumbly mixture like this:

Take a pinch of the buttery-sugary mixture and put it in your mouth. Chew. Swallow. Then sprinkle the rest evenly over the sweet potatoes in the pan.


Bake in a 350 degree oven for about 40 minutes. It will be more or less depending on the size of dish you use, whether you double the topping, etc. But the top should be nice and browned and bubbly so just watch it.


You can see close up how the sugar and butter caramelize the coconut to create crunchy, chewy, sweet, thanksgiving-y heaven in a pan:



Did I mention kids will eat this like candy? Probably because it pretty much is candy. But who doesn't like a side of candy with their turkey??


Trust me. You'll like them :)

So on Thanksgiving we went to my mom's house for dinner. Then we visited for awhile. Here's what Chloe was going to wear on Thanksgiving.

She is always full of smiles!

 

Her turkey clip:

By Erin's request for me to post them, here are the turkey clips I made...

And the tree clips...

I wanted her to wear her brand new sweater dress and headband though, so this is what she ended up wearing, but then she spilled cranberry sauce on herself, so luckily I had a spare dress in the diaper bag.

It was little Emma's birthday also on Thanksgiving, so Ash had a little party at the stake center for her. It was cute, she did a good job with everything. She first had a little bingo game for the kids and when they won, they got to go and pick a prize. Of course Chlo had to have a coloring book, and she couldn't even wait to color until we got home, she had to test it out at the church. After the game, they had a pinata, and all the kiddos got to take turns. Here is a pic of Chlo with her sucker. It was a lot of fun. I can't believe all these babies are getting so big!

We went over to the Cooks' for a little bit after the party, but we were so tired, and we needed to make our early morning black Friday shopping plans, so we left Todd's mom's earlier than we were going to. The original plan was to set the alarm clock on Todd's phone for 3:30 so we could leave the house at 4:15 to go to Target in Centerville so we could wait in line and also hit Toys R Us and Best Buy, but I was so tired from a lack of sleep all week, and then Chloe woke up at 1:30 so even though Todd woke me up at least twice, I got up at 5:30. I was panicking at the fact that it was 'so late' in my opinion, so we decided not to go to Target and we went to Best Buy instead. I was surprised there wasn't near the amount of people I thought there would be. Plus after we found the vacuum we wanted, we only waited in line like five or ten minutes at the most. Then even at Toys R Us, I was sure it would be a nightmare, but it wasn't bad either, and we waited about the same amount of time in line there also. Then we decided to go to Circuit City since it was still pretty early. Good thing we went there too because they had some way good deals. A couple hours later, we headed up to Tremonton since Todd's family (the Cook side of the family) was having their Thanksgiving get together. It was fun. At first I wondered if I would have anyone to talk to, which I was wrong, because Todd's sisters and parents were there, and then we ran into Tiffany, and I hadn't seen her since mine and Todd's wedding. Chloe absolutely loved her! She kept going back to Tiff and would let her hold her. It was so cute. Chloe also enjoyed playing with the little crawling babies. It was fun, and I can't wait for Tiffany to take Chloe's pictures in the spring.

Here's another picture of our tree! I love it with the stars on the top! I think it turned out really pretty!

On Saturday night we were going to go down to Temple Square and walk around, but when we got down there, we couldn't find parking. I should have known we wouldn't find parking with it being Thanksgiving weekend and a Jazz game! Oh well, we walked around the Gateway instead, which was still fun. I guess we will have to go back down to Temple Square on a week night when hopefully it's not as crowded. 

Here's a cute picture I took of Chloe yesterday. It's so funny because if she knows you're going to take her picture, she will say 'cheese' or sometimes she will take my cell phone, turn it backwards, and then hold it up to herself, and say 'cheese' like she's taking a picture of herself!