The Rose Bowl

The third and final leg of R&T’s never ending vacation was a trip to beautiful California. The couple was lucky enough to attend the College Football National Championship (thanks to a Xmas gift from Rachel’s dad!), and they watched as the Texas Longhorns lost to Alabama. Okay, so it was a huge bummer to see the Longhorns season end that way. But it was cool to be in a stadium with so much tradition and it was a lot of fun to scream so loud that you lose your voice as you cheer on your team in a national title game.  Enjoy these pics of The Rose Bowl.

  

The couple was also able to do the tourist thing in Los Angeles for the first time, as well as spend a couple of days with their good friend Princeton. During this time, T&R went to Universal Studios,

 

and they did a few Hollywood tours and saw some famous spots.

   

Thanks Hollywood and thanks Princeton for a great time!

And now, the vacation is finally over and T&R couldn’t be happier. The holiday season was a blast, but all the couple wants to do now is get back home, sit on the couch with the dog, and watch bad TV.

Ahhhh…

T&R

VEGASSSS!

Believe it. Todd and Rachel went back to Vegas one short year after their first trip together to Sin City. This time it was a New Year celebration coupled with their friend Meagen’s 30th birthday! Joining Meagan and Chris and T&R were Adam as well as Kara and Charlie. They were also joined by RyJack and Kyle.

Rachel and Todd spent their first evening in Vegas playing slots, getting free drinks and meeting up with everyone as they got into town.

On New Year’s Eve the group ate a nice meal at The Mix, a restaurant on the 64th floor of THEhotel at Mandalay Bay. The food was tasty and the view was awesome.

   

Later that evening the group sauntered over to Rum Jungle, a bar that charges you a flat rate for admission and then lets you drink whatever you want all night. Hmmm. Could result in trouble…

The group had a blast dancing the night away when they weren’t standing in line for drinks!

     

They spent the New Year’s countdown on the streets of Las Vegas, watching as the sky lit up, and then the group promptly raced back inside to enjoy the bar they’d already paid for.

Happy New Year!

T&R

Christmas 2009

Merry Christmas everybody! This Christmas Todd and Rachel enjoyed a long vacation as they spent the holidays with Rachel’s family in Hartsburg, Illinois. The couple stayed at Rachel’s grandparent’s house, as did Kara and Ann. There were at least 40 people in and out of the house over the course of the week and the group spent Christmas eating and napping and eating and watching football and eating and playing cards and playing ping pong and eating.

When they weren’t doing that, they enjoyed the winter wonderland that is Illinois at Christmas time.

 

It turned into an all-out snowball fight with the Texas group taking some time to figure out how exactly you make a freaking snowball, before unloading on each other.

It was really special to see Rachel’s family come together, to be grateful for the time they had, to share old stories, and to make new memories. It was a dose of much needed family time, and as R&T packed up to leave Hartsburg after their week of celebration it was hard to choke back the tears.

Of course, with a trip to Vegas on the horizen it’s not too hard to get pumped about the future.

Merry Xmas friends and family! Hope your holiday was as jolly and food-filled as ours was.

R&T

The Dinner Party

This past Christmas T&R hosted a dinner party and the turnout was pretty awesome! I guess when you get to a certain age inviting people to a “dinner party” gets a better response than inviting people over for a “house party”. Dude, we’re getting old.

  

Anyway, Rachel went all out for this meal. Her mad scientist brain had been piecing this menu together for a long time, and it was great to see it all come together. T&R had been tasting recipies for a couple of months in preparation for this and had the help of Rachel’s mom on the day of to put together the EIGHT course meal!

For your consideration, the menu:

I

Winter Squash Soup with Gruyere Crouton

California Pinot Gris

 

II

Scallop and Arugula with Citrus and Pomegranate

California Pinot Noir

 

III

Walnut and Pumpkin Ravioli with Sage butter Cream Sauce

German Riesling

 

IV

Blood Orange and Prosecco Sorbetto

Italian Sparkling Wine

 

V

Bacon and Crimini Chicken Potpie

Washington Chardonnay

 

VI

Braised Short Rib with Garlic Mashed Potato

Spanish Monstant

 

VII

Assorted Seasonal Cheeses with Cranberry Pear Chutney

Chilean Cabernet

 

VIII

Apple Tartlet with Cinnamon Balsamic Reduction and Bourbon Whipped Cream

French Anjou

 

Believe it or not, it was all homemade. Todd still has dreams of the scallop dancing around his palate as the pomegranate let out its juicy burst. He wakes up screaming into the night as the hauntingly beautiful bacon pot pie calls to him with its flaky puff pastry crust. The apple tartlet still makes him get weak in the knees as…

Okay, you get the idea. But if you were there you know what Todd’s talking about. Thanks to all who came and celebrated with us! And please send us pictures of the FOOD if you have any!

Happy Holidays!

T&R

Big 12 Championship Game!

Last weekend, R&T made the drive up to Dallas to visit their good friend Meagan and her boyfriend Chris, and also to attend the Big 12 Championship Game at the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium!

They drove in on Friday night and had a chance to see Meagan’s new condo in Dallas. They had a few drinks and hit the sack, tired after bunk traffic on 35. The next day the quartet went to one of Meagan and Chris’ favorite spots and had lunch. Todd had fish and chips that made him want to kiss the cook. And he saw the cook. He was a hairy dude with close set eyes. They were that good. Anyway, Rachel and Meagan went shopping for New Year’s dresses and the dudes went back to Meagan’s apartment to drink beers and watch Alabama destroy Florida to become SEC champions and more importantly, National Championship bound.

When Rachel got back, R&T hit the road to Arlington to experience the Big 12 Championship matchup of Texas vs. Nebraska. The couple was pretty confident that Texas would thump the Huskers, but they were pumped to see the new Cowboys stadium. They arrived in Arlington, paid 20 bones to park a mile and a half away, and made the trek to the battlefield.

While the seats are damned near impossible to find in this new place, the field itself is something to behold as is (yes, I’m gonna talk about it) the ENORMOUS VIDEO SCREEN! It truly does stretch from the 20 yard line to the 20 yard line and it is almost impossible to actually watch the live game with that massive HD screen calling to you from above. For real, people had their mouth’s open as they watched it. Of course, they were from Nebraska so it was hard to tell…

As you probably know by now, the game came down to a last second field goal from Texas to defeat Nebraska 13-12. The game was so close that the couple thought time actually expired while Texas was behind. So did the Nebraska fans evidently, as they rushed the field with joy. After a review, officals saw that Texas still had one second left on the clock and they nailed a 46 yard field goal to send them to the National Championship to face ‘Bama.

Whew! That was a close one. Let’s hope Texas sharpens their offense in the next 30 days.

Hook ‘em and thanks to Meagan and Chris for letting us crash and showing us a great time.

R&T

Thanksgiving 2009

Happy Turkey Day!

This year marked the first year that Todd and Rachel hosted their families for Thanksgiving and it also marked the first time they cooked their own 20lb. Thanksgiving turkey!

Rachel found a recipe online to brine the turkey as to hold in the juicy flavor. The night before they prepared the maranade, prepped the bird, and stuck it in a pot of ice along with the brine overnight. The next day they popped that bird in the oven, made hommade stuffing, the rainbow Jello, and a few other small things. The great thing was that family members were willing to each bring a dish so T&R didn’t have nearly as much work as they could have had!!!

So, that afternoon they sat down to a Thanksgiving feast outside on the deck devouring Rachel and Todd’s turkey and stuffing, Rachel’s dad’s broccoli and cheese, Aunt Martha’s cranapple pie, Travis’ greenbean cassarole, Ray’s mashed potatoes, and many more treats. The meal was delicious and Rachel’s first attempt at a bonafide Thanksgiving turkey was a homerun.

There were a number of pies that day, and though T&R worked hard at it over the next week they were unable to engulf the five or six pies left with them. They were good though!

After the feast, the group sat down for a few football games. The Cowboys stomped the Raiders (I was thankful for Dallas’ easy schedule that day!), and the Longhorns defeated the Aggies in an exciting game. Man, it’s awesome being a fan of excellent teams.

T&R were so grateful for food, family and football that day! They were also thankful for Todd’s dad helping with much needed supplies and Thanksgiving wisdom, as well as the whole family’s help cleaning up afterwards.

Hope your Thanksgiving was as delicious as ours! Happy Turkey day!

T&R

Halloween Karaoke

On Halloween T&R got with a ton of their friends and went to Austin Karaoke for costumed Karaoke madness!!!

The group sang the night away in a private room. Among the cast of characters were

  

John and Mica

Mike and Anna

Meagan

& Ryan.

Rachel put together a number of creepy treats and delicious libations and a good time was had by all. 

  

Don’t believe us? Then answer me this. How can you not have fun singing “Don’t Stop Believing” while drinking smoking punch and riding around town in a Hummer limo.

Yeah. Believe it.

Thanks to all who helped us sing (badly) into the night!

  

R&T

Texas vs. Oklahoma

This year, Todd went to his first Texas State Fair and saw Texas and Oklahoma showdown in their annual epic event!

He went with his father-in-law, and the pair left San Antonio at 2am this night before the game. The fans predicted BCS rankings and amped themselves up for a contest that would surely be memorable as they drove to Austin. They got into Austin at 3:30am and hopped on a bus full of UT fans, headed for Dallas. Todd caught some zzz’s as the 2005 National Championship played on the bus’ TV and the group rolled into Dallas a few hours later.

Energized and ready for game day, Todd and Mark purchased a couple corndogs and a few brews and toured the fairgrounds. There was fried food as far as the eye could see, and Mark and Todd noted that Fried Butter was for sale as well as Chicken Fried Bacon. There was a buzz as College Gameday was covering the contest that week and the duo got to their seats, eager for the game to begin.

The energy of the place was undeniable as Texas fans and OU fans alike roared for their teams. It truly is like no other game in the college season and has the feel of a bowl game.

While the offensive production was not what they expected (the game became more about Texas’ powerhouse defense), Mark and Todd had a blast as they ate fried food, drank beer, wore orange, and watched their favorite team in the world beat OU 16-13.

Hook ‘em!!! And thanks to Mark for the one of a kind experience!!!

T&R

Luke’s Baptism

This past weekend, T&R drove up to Austin (one of their favorite things to do) for their Godson’s Baptism. For those of you who haven’t seen him in a while, here’s the Lukemeister General:

Luke seemed to be having a pretty good time at his baptism until Todd scooped him up. You could just hear the little dude saying, “Todd, you have no idea what you’re doing, do you?”

The weekend was a blast, as Todd and Rachel got to hang out with a bunch of their closest friends over the weekend including John and Mica and RyJack.

We had some good times, Ryan and Sarah!

Thanks for having a kid!,

T&R.

P.S. Thanks for allowing us to use these pics even though we didn’t ask!! Sorry.

CANstruction 2009

This year, Rachel’s firm went all out and worked their butts off to create a really wonderful piece for the 2009 CANstruction event built at North Star Mall in San Antonio.

As we detailed last year, CANstruction is an international event that showcases architects and designers around the world by allowing them to build amazing pieces out of canned food items. All of the cans go to the Food Bank, and many of the teams spend hours upon hours raising the money and just as many hours designing the pieces they will build.

Rachel’s firm decided to build some cowboy boots this year and the public response was huge. Take a peek at these impressive pics!

   

   

All their hardwork paid off, and the group was thrilled to receive 1st Place this year! The group did an amazing job!  These delicious Pork and Beans cans are among the Food Bank’s favorite donations. Congrats guys!!!

T&R