Homecoming

This Friday we went to Kevin's Homecoming football game with him and his girlfriend, Taylor. The tradition in Texas, and maybe other southern states, is to make a Mum for your date if you are a boy or a garter(which they wear on the arm) if you are a boy. You can also make your own. There were also babies that were wearing them, a girl by us was given one by her Grandpa who she attended the game with. There are single mums, double mums, triple mums. Generally the older you are the more mums you are supposed to have. From the mum or garter there are streamers hanging down. They generally went mid thigh, but there were some that went all the way to the floor. The mum is your school colors or your dates school colors. Some people even go extreme and do a mash up of school colors so both are represented fairly. The streamers don't just have to be ribbon, they can be feathers, chains really anything you can get to stick on with a glue gun. Then after you have those basic things you personalize with your name, bells, again anything you can get to stick on with a glue gun.

                                  This is Kevin going up to Taylor's door

      

 I think she was embarrassed about how big it was. Kevin loved how big it was because all the freshman's at school were a lot smaller than hers but hers was still smaller than the Senior girls.

Sorry the pictures are so blurry. I don't know what was going on. But it was hard for him to get the pin through her shirt. She kept complaining that it was so heavy and that he poked her.

                    I also made her a shirt, so she changed into something more casual.

So then we get to the game and the stadium is like a professional stadium. They have a huge score board that you could watch the game from. They had regular bleacher seats and what I call baseball field seats. They only had these options on the home side, the visitors had to make do with only bleachers. The stadium we were in is used for all the Varsity games in Mansfield ISD and they rotate as to who is home. 

                   Pretty cool tunnel the opposing team came running out of (Cedar Hill Longhorns)

 The girls to the left are the "Gold Dusters" This is their drill team. Their outfits and routine were very 1940's. It was interesting. Not at all what I was expecting. They and the Cedar Hill " High Steppers" both performed at half time and did a kick line. The Gold Dusters also performed a routine, but it was very much like a cheerleader routine with pom poms and all.

 I swear I am not this white when I look in the mirror. It looks like I never spend any time outside.

                                                                   Visitors side

Okay the next like 40 pictures is of the marching band because the were A-MAZ-ING! The performed Dante's Inferno. They did so many intricate moves and were perfect in every formation. I wish my high school had had a band like this. 

 The whole band is laying down here and getting up in the next picture

I was very fascinated with it so I won't feel bad if you just scroll on through :)

 

This is Mansfield's tiger head that they cram all the players into and then run out. I think I am claiming Cedar Hill the winner on this one.

The game was kind of a let down. There were a lot of fights that broke out on the field but none were called by the ref.... don't understand that. The QB was horrible. I say they kind of gave up during the second half and in the middle of the 4th quarter half the audience left on our side. We did have a good time though and were happy we could go out with Kevin and Taylor (even though they didn't sit by us for more than 20 minutes)

Chopped Inspired Dessert

It has been a while since I have done a cooking blog (there were complaints that that was all I did, apparently they were appreciated) and I decided it was time to do another one. Daniel and I love to cook, so naturally we love cooking shows. Chopped is one of our favorites. We were watching an episode that we have seen a couple times ( the one with Trig super annoying arrogant chef) anyway, their mystery ingredients were bananas, phyllo dough, pomegranate and miso. Well he made a banana rolled in phyllo dough and topped with a miso/pomegranate sauce. We decided to take his idea but top instead with banana foster. Phyllo dough, for those of you that don't know, is super temperamental(Trig whined about his being all broken and poor quality, what a whiner.) But you have to work quickly with it before it dries out. Each sheet has to be brushed with butter before you work with it so that it doesn't tear. You also have to have a damp cloth ( I used a paper towel) so that the sheets can absorb the moisture

 So I buttered 4 of the sheets and stacked them. Then I took the sauteed bananas that Daniel took care of for me...

And added them and some cinnamon to the dough and rolled them up like an egg roll

I placed them on a jelly roll pan with parchment paper and threw them in the oven for about 10 minutes. You are just waiting for them to get crispy. The layers will separate some, but this just adds to the flakiness of the pastry.

Daniel and I both really enjoy banana foster ( I think I just like it because it is a fancy caramel sauce) but we decided to try our hand at making some. For our recipe you do need rum the drink, but you can always just use rum flavoring. All the alcohol cooks out and you can barely taste the rum where with an artificial flavoring you might not be so lucky and it will probably remind you of the horrible taffys you used to get for Halloween. 

Daniel made this sauce: you take 1/2 cup of butter to 1 cup of brown sugar. You want to completely melt the sugar into the brown sugar. ( Daniel used the butter left in the pan that he had used to sautee his bananas) Allow them to come to a slight bubble. Then add 1/3 cup of rum and turn off and remove from heat. The liquid will continue to boil. If you want to be extra fancy like the people on tv you can light the fumes on fire    ( we did not try this but I am tempted to next time). You just have to remember to light the fumes and not the actual sauce. 

It should come out to the consistency of caramel. 

We added a side of whipped cream just to add some creaminess and a cooling to the bite. It was delicious. We are grateful that we can see an idea and make the product even if we don't necessarily use the right techniques. 

The Birds

By the Kroger there are always a ton of birds and I don't understand why they all congregate there. But they are so loud (as you can hear in the movie, all the squeaking is the birds) and they all fly. You have to be careful so they don't all attack you.BEWARE THE BIRDS

Poison Ivy

So three weeks ago Daniel was cleaning up behind his work. He didn't notice but he must have brushed against some poison ivy. He noticed it two days later he went to the doctor. Daniel is very allergic to poison ivy and has to get shots before it gets really bad. So the first time he went, they told him they couldn't give him the whole steroid shot because he has had it too recently (when he fell earlier this summer). So they gave him half the steroid shot and some cream to ease the swelling. He was really cautious and didn't want it to spread to me so we watched very closely to make sure it didn't blister.

So the pictures are actually a week later. The shot didn't help at all and the cream made it itch more. So he went back and the doctor said she didn't know what she could do for him and went and consulted with the other doctors on call. She decided to give him a round of steroids for 16 days starting with 6 pills and going to 1 pill. She also realized she didn't give him anything for the itch and felt really bad. So with relief from the itch and the steroids it is almost all gone.

Glad that I did not get Poison Ivy and did not have to have pictures of our legs side by side comparing whose was worse.