It's A Fall Thing...

Guess what time of the year it is? Prickly Pear Jelly time!!!! Last year Katie, Laura and I all had the idea to make some home-made gift baskets for Christmas presents. We chose a breakfast theme and made biscotti , hot coco, scone mix, peppermint marshmallows and what ended up being the home run of the gift, Prickly Pear jelly. We had no idea that is was going to be as popular as it was, our friends and co-workers told us they hoarded it like gold in their homes, only taking it out for extreme cravings and special occasions.
We decided since it was such a hit last year, we had to do it this year! So last weekend we all went up to my parent's house in the Hualapai Mountains (pronounced Wal-a-pie) to start our 2010 jam-making weekend. (Full Disclosure: I am using some photos from 2009 to show the process, we made such a large batch this year that by the time we got to juicing stage it was too dark outside to see.)

The first thing we have to do is pick the Prickly Pears, much easier said than done, because Prickly Pears grow on this:

Yes we totally harvest the fruit from Cacti. What great Arizona girls are we? We are able to harvest the fruit just a little down the mountain from where my parents live. While it is fun it can also be dangerous. Cacti have a way of sneaking up onto your ankles and tend to hurt, a lot. Katie yelled out this poetic piece during the harvest trip, "SON OF A NUTCRACKER!!!!!!"

We picked a ton of Prickly Pears this year. We wanted to make a nice big batch for our Christmas gifts and to have a little leftover for ourselves. It took us about an hour playing pioneer women, traipsing through the woods until we filled up our bucket. After washing the Prickly Pears you have to cook them for a couple hours.

This is where the incredible color starts to form. The water you boil them in turns the most amazing shade of pink/purply/red ever. I don't even think I know a name of a color to describe it! We cooked two ways this year. There were two pots on the stove and then a giant pot we cooked outside on a propane stove contraption that we use for deep-frying our Thanksgiving turkey.

How cute is Laura? After the Prickly Pears are cooked down, the real process starts. If you haven't figured it out by the name of the fruit or Katie's cursing, Prickly Pears have prickles on them. Since we love all our friends and this isn't Nightmare Before Christmas, we spend a good chunk of the time sifting the pulp and stickers out. The first step is to chop up the whole pears into smaller pieces.

Once they are nice and chopped up we place them into a food mill to get as much juice out as possible.

This part is fun and messy! We then take the juice from under the food mill and begin the straining process.

The process is very time consuming and it takes all of us working a couple hours straight to get it done. We don't mind though. It is fun to chat with my sisters and my mother. Many times the conversation turns to if we think we could make it should the world suffer some major disaster and we lost all modern technology. Consensus is if there are no Zombies or Mutant creatures, yes. Otherwise, Jesus take us now!

The juice goes twice through a strainer and finally through a cheese cloth. This way all you are left with is a delicious, syrupy Prickly Pear Juice. The next steps are pretty generic in jelly making. You add your sweetener and pectin, bottle them up and can away. We ended up with about 52 jars of Prickly Pear Jelly!
I love this time of the year because it really is the starting off point to our Holiday Season. Our next event is our "McLarty-Jaramillo Annual Fall Festival Weekend." This includes all the fun October activities we love like carving pumpkins, a ghost tour and a visit to Schnepf Farms. When my sisters get married there are going to be a few more hyphens in the title though!

Even though Phoenix is suffering a heat wave, I am so ready for fall time. I pulled out my first Halloween decorations and can't wait for the cooler weather. This Holiday Season will be my first one as a married lady and I am actually hosting Christmas at my house! Luckily my family and my in-laws are wonderful people who would be happy if all I made was pizza and salad. As for the Christmas baskets this year, you are just going to have to wait and see what the theme is!

Happy Fall!
-Mrs.J

Gleekin' Out

If you don't know I am OBSESSED with Glee. From the moment I watched the series premiere I knew it was meant to be. This show is A-mazing.



I think if you did chorus in high school, this show tugs at your heart strings. Even though when I did choir my junior and senior year of high school there was not that much drama involved, it still brings back memories. Must be the same reason I love High School Musical so much.

Anyways last week was the season premiere of Glee and I knew I had to something special to commemorate this occasion. So I invited some of my nearest and dearest over for Glee Party 2010.

I made us wonderful Glee style "hats" for the occasions and put together a Nacho Bar. Let me tell you this, a Nacho Bar is a great way to do food when you are throwing a party. Everything can be thrown together really quickly and doesn't break the bank.

I warmed up some nacho cheese in the crock pot, made some beef with taco seasoning and then set out all the fixings.

Don't they just look yummy? This was my sister Laura's creation. She is a wonderful Nacho maker.

Some of my best friends came over to enjoy the party.

Have you met my neighbors Nick and Sarah? If not you should because they pretty much are the most ballest neighbors anyone could have. It is really fun living next to couple who is your age.

This my friend Jessica and my sister Katie showing off the blue "slushees" we made for the party. Really they were just Pina Coladas with blue food coloring, but I don't think anyone was complaining!

This little gem in the photo with me is Randi. She seriously is like sunshine. If you are having a bad day, one call to Randi can turn your frown upside down.

 Finally the Mr. and Mrs. Todd was very good and wore his Glee hat all night long. I am so thankful that he indulges in some of my ideas. I could never have married a fuddy-duddie. He is never too cool for school and for that I am thankful.
After dinner we all sat down to watch the show, which was awesome. I had made some "Fauxstess Cupcakes" for desert. I didn't take any pictures because even though they tasted incredible, they didn't look as cute as I was hoping for. It was my first time making a ganache and it never really hardened since the temperature was still probably around 80 degrees in my house. I will make them again when it cools down and hopefully the finished product will come out looking better.
Here is what they were supposed to look like.

And here is the blog I got the recipe from. However, I did switch up the filling. I used the filling from an Oatmeal Pie recipe I make. It was much easier and I really love marshmallow so you can't go wrong.

All in all it was wonderful night with some wonderful people. We dined, drank and laughed the night away. I feel so very blessed for the people that I have in my life. Even the girls got in on the excitement of the Glee season premier. Honestly though, would it be a House of Jaramillo blog if I didn't mention my cats?

Nunu probably supports Vocal Adrenaline and was not wanting to be support the New Directions Glee Club.

and Scioscia just wanted to make sure she wasn't missing anything.

Don't forget all your Gleeks, the Brittany episode is one tonight!!!

-Mrs.J

We Are Moving...

blogs...that is. Gotcha!

Remember how I have been saying all along that Wordpress is where it is at because of the stats and all the goodies? Well I have been having major blogger's envy over how cute some blogs on the "New Blogger!" are. I had to jump ship and make my own cute little blog. So I packed up the old blog posts and copy/pasted those suckers right on over to Blogger.

So now that I have your attention I guess I should give you a little more material than the obvious fact that you are no longer on Wordpress reading this! I have a lot of things stewing in my mind I want to blog about. I seriously need to get my b-u-t-t in motion and write stuff down. I am also trying my hand at photo editing though, so I am working on editing the photos from this past week to put on the blog. I guess there are a couple things I have been writing about the blog that could use an update.

1) Our cat's butt

Tuesday will be our LAST day of the Giardia treatment for Scioscia and I am saying my prayers double time that God will bless our cat with a leak-free rear end. So far, everything is nice and dry. We are so ready to be done having to give her medicine. This poor kitty has pretty much been poked, prodded, pill-popped, snot sucked and liquid shot since we got her. Her first problem was this constant sneezing that came along with a stuffy nose. Two vet visits and one anitibiotic treatment later, we find out it is just seasonal allergies. Which apparently means the only season she won't be sneezy is Summer because as soon as fall came so did her allergies. Once the allergies cleared up, we noticed the leaky bum and as you know that has been a thorn in my side for a while now. Let me tell you this, if you want to know how your spouse is going to be as a parent, get a pet. When it comes to kitty health care I take a "grab em' and get it done" approach while Todd takes the "maybe if I talk to them nicely and follow them around for 10 minuets they will just open their mouths and let me put the medicine in." Scioscia has a little bit of a complex when it comes to medicines, so Todd's approach does not go very well. I love the man with the power of a million burning suns, but this is just one thing he can't do very well.

2) No Spend September

We are almost done with September and really it wasn't that bad. It went over so well that we might just have a No Spend October and November and December. (I will just take this time to say I hate property taxes and car registration.) I probably noticed the not-spending the most when it came to our eating out, which is probably ok because that brings me to...

3) Our Workout

Yeah, so about that. Summer is hot in Phoenix, you know? It is hard to want to workout when it is 115 outside. Todd made a deal with me, if I can workout 3 times a week at our community complex for 3 months, I can get a gym membership with my sister Katie! I am very excited about this because I don't really like working out at the complex. There are only 2 treadmills and about 15 people waiting to use them at 5 pm. Katie also is fun to hang out with, so that is another driving factor. I read in an interview that Christina Aguilera once said her weight gain when she got engaged/married was "love chub." Girl, I get it! I really want to just get healthy again. I know that in probably under 2 years Todd and I are going to start family and I figure if I can get my body into great shape now, it will be easier to get pregnant, go through labor and then get back in shape afterwards. This week is my starting off point. I have to make it 3 times a week for October, November and December then a gym membership is mine! Just in time for all those New Year's Resolutions, I might just get a killer deal on it and you know how I love me some deals!

Well I guess that is all I needed to update right now. I am going to start making myself blog a lot more. I started House of Jaramillo as sort of documentation of what our first years were like. I want to look back at this when I am 70 and laugh at what our life used to be like.

Thanks for helping us move,
-Mrs.J

I have an addiction…

But really it is ok because this is not a bad addiction. I recently discovered that I have a serious addiction to dun, dun duh…coupon clipping! Did you know that going to the market and saving $58 on your grocery bill could be such a rush? Because it seriously is. You should try it out.
So as you may know, we are coming to the end of week 3 in “No Spend September.” Things are going pretty well, there have been a few things that just couldn’t be avoided. I had book club at the start of the week and we always do a little dinner with our books. I bought some splatter screens for the sake of my stove and my skin (see this post if you don’t think those were a necessity) and okay, maybe I didn’t need that cute fall decoration that I found at Ross, but really I am trying to decorate a home here people!

Anyways, around August I decided I would try my hand at the clipping coupon deal. I never thought I would start coupon clipping yet, Todd and I don’t really eat that much food with just the two of us and all the news specials I would see on TV about coupon clipping usually involved a mother of 8 kids buying 10 gallons of milk to the 11th free. What would I do with 11 gallons of milk? For the most part Todd and I do our shopping at Fresh and Easy. We love this store, I mean REALLY love it. We tried to marry it, but plural marriage is frowned upon in Arizona, who knew? 

I am telling you, you will love this store! If their great prices and no preservatives approach don’t win you over, their weekly coupons will. I even have set up my market schedule to collide with their coupon schedule. (Dear FTC, Fresh and Easy in no way paid me in coupons to write this, although I wish they would.)

Me before my love of coupons...

So it was with a somewhat hesitant heart that I decided to try to take my coupons to the local Fry’s market. This was really a live and learn experience. The first time I went I decided I wanted to bring Todd along…on a Sunday…after church was out for most people. Did you know that Todd doesn’t like women running into him with their shopping carts or children whose father isn’t watching them and letting them run around like a banshee?

Dear father at Frys, please take this to heart.

Let’s just say that by the time we reached the checkout counter I was worried that I would be served with divorce papers if the excruciating trip didn’t produce some serious savings. Alas, I was able to turn Todd’s frown upside down when our $100 bill shrunk down to half of that. I realized I was onto something with this coupon deal.
The second time I decided to do it, I wanted to be organized and able to attack my enemy with surprise. I went at 8 am on Thursday, I love shopping with ladies from the local retirement homes. I also created a spreadsheet to keep myself on task. I know right, Heidi actually did something to be organized. I think Todd must do some crazy organizational spells when I am sleeping at night. They probably include things like “and she will put things away in the fridge like they belong, she will remember to turn off the bathroom light, she will grow to love spreadsheets!!!!”
 Trip two went much-much better. I was able to collect my thoughts in the empty cat food aisle, I got everything I wanted and I saved $58. As I walked out to the car, my adrenaline was pumping. I wanted to show every person my receipt. As I stood there loading my car with my steals and deals with a maniacal smile on my face, I realized how people become addicted to the coupon game. It really is exciting.
I just wend on my third trip this week, $38 dollars saved! I ended up buying 43 items and spending around $53, that is just a little over a dollar per item. After three succesful coupon-clipping grocery trips, I was even able to convince the Hubs that we should get the Sunday paper. I get my first one this Sunday and I am ready to take my market shopping to a whole new saving money level!

Me, now in love with coupons.

Happy shopping friends! We also finished the first enzyme treatment for Nunu and Scioscia so I will updating you on how that whole experience went.
Enjoy your weekend,
-Heidi

No Spend September

Today is September first and this marks the start of a fiscal fast in House of Jaramillo.

Todd and I are going to try to not spend any money for the month of September, not my idea but I was able to warm up to it.  Now when I say “no money” I really mean nothing that is not a necessity. Obviously we have to keep buying gas, groceries and paying our bills. This fast is really going to cut out the extra-fat-spending that we do during the month. When I go through the list of how we will change our habits, it probably won’t seem that drastic since for the most part we are a pretty frugal couple.
Todd proposed the idea to me as this, “I really want to try and not spend any money in September to see how much we can put into savings.” I replied, “No, because once you see how much we save we will never go shopping again and I can’t live that way,”  which is true. Where others may enjoy gambling, buying booze or getting pampered, nothing is as exciting to me as shopping. I don’t even have to spend large amounts of money, but knowing that I can get a get myself a little treat, makes me so happy. However, since I married Todd I am learning that there can also be joy in seeing money in your bank account, not just new clothes in your closet. So I agreed to try it this September.
So what will be cutting back on?
entertainment: Level of Difficulty 3-Easy money.

 We are not going to cancel our Netflix, we did streamline this month to 1 movie at a time unlimited but this was done before we made the choice to do No Spend September. We made this choice because with instant-streaming on the Wii and movies on TV, our two movies might sit there for a really long time before we got around to watching them. As far as going to the movies? That is not really something Todd and I do anyways. It is just another way to watch a huge chunk of change go down the drain.
Food: Level of Difficulty 4-What about the value menu?

 

As far as eating out goes, we really don’t eat out that much, it is a super easy way to blow 40 bucks.  However, on the weekends it is a little fun for us to spin through a drive through and grab something for dinner. If we do go out to eat, we usually have a coupon of some sort. Since we got married and moved in together, I have been packing lunches for Todd and myself every day. If you think about it, it would probably cost us 10$ a day for both us to eat, and I am saying cheapy fast-food, by the end of the week that is $50! Add up it for the month and you are looking at about $200 in over-processed, un-digestible food. While not buying lunch will be easy, not eating out during the weekend will be harder. It is a nice break from me having to cook and also a nice little treat of eating unhealthy but yummy food. As far as groceries go, Todd and I started only allowing ourselves to go shopping every other week. We make a list for what we need for two weeks and stick with it. It get hard on the last part of week throwing together dinners, but I find we are wasting less food and using up our pantry staples.
Shopping: Level of difficulty 9 Is extra money really worth my sanity?????

Here we come to the hardest topic, but the one I feel we will probably be saving the most money with. When I married Todd I knew my single-girl spending days were over. Now I had to pay for my own gas, groceries and take on other bills. Bank of Mom & Dad was closing up shop and spending whatever,whenever was now going to be budgeted down to the bare essentials. Somehow along the way I found a loophole in the system. A way to go shopping not only with the hubs, but have him happily hand over the cash. This was shopping for items in our house. A trip to Kohls for kitchen gadgets, a stop by Ross for wall hanging or a run through Target for kitty supplies can usually be supported by the husband. I got my thrill of shopping with none of backlash from Todd. I guess is this is part where I say “Hi, my name is Heidi and I am a shopaholic.” So now it is with a sad heart, I say goodbye to my easy shopping weekends for the month of September. I agreed to do the fiscal fast and I can’t back out now.
Even though I know it is going to be tough, I am really not that stressed out about it. There was a major shift in my spending habits when I married Todd and survived that. Really, how hard can this be? I am going to approach this month with an exciting treat at the end of some extra rainy-day cash in the bank and maybe break away a little more at my shopping addiction. Wish me luck.
-Heidi J.
PS- We just got the medicine for Scioscia’s bum but we are waiting to start it on Monday since it is 8 days of treatment, I will post about it soon!

For better or worse, in sickness and health….

I am really calling in the vows on that last part. If you are our Facebook friend, you recently have been lucky enough to be delighted to the imagery that is the olive oil burn…
About a week ago I was preparing what would have been a delightful dinner of fried rice. The carrots and celery were chopped, rice pre-cooked and the chicken marinated. All I needed to do was throw it all together in a pan. I started heating up some olive oil so I could cook the chicken before adding in the rest of ingredients. No big deal, this must have been the millionth time of cooking chicken this way. Somewhere between time 999,000 and 1,000,000 I must have lost it though because I ended up spilling hot oil all over my hand. The whole hand. From wrist to knuckle. Needless to say there was screaming, crying and I think I mildly went into shock. Wouldn’t you? Look at this?

To make a long story short, and to save from any more unsightly photos, let me just say for the last week I have been unable to do anything with my left hand. This is making me very unhappy. See, this whole time I have felt my contribution to our marriage right now is the cooking, cleaning and all that fun home stuff. Since I am working at finding a big-girl job, I haven’t been bringing anything to the table financially. Taking care of the house is my way of helping ease the stress on Todd. It has been really tough for the last week not being able to do as much as I want to and depending on Todd pick up the slack. He has been handling it like a champ though. On Tuesday he even had to wash my hair for me and he did it with love and compassion.

It is funny how when you get married and you say your vows you think they are really only for the huge things in life; finances, children, cancer. You forget about all the small every day things that you are committing to when you stand there and promise these things together.  It’s a promise to love each other even when your wife’s hand looks like something out of a horror movie and she can’t open a bottle or squeeze the jelly onto her toast. It’s the fact that you will turn off whatever TV show you were watching to come upstairs and help her wash her hair, even condition it to make sure all the tangles are out… and feel happy about doing it.

It is in these small times when we are able to really pull together as a team or when I am able to lean on Todd because I am a little weak that I know we will be able to make it through whatever life can throw at us. That is a pretty incredible feeling.
Hope I can heal soon,
-Heidi

Well Poop…Part I

Look at this adorable face, no really do, because she might be super-duper cute, but she also has turned into a money pit and after I tell you the story about her pooper you might not think she is so cute anymore. So just look at her and remember all the good things about her…

Now look at this. Look at this little boy, so blissful with his little puppy and kitty. How happy he looks! Little does he know that right now that dog is infected with what has become archenemies number one in the House of Jaramillo…also known as Giardia and that dog is getting ready to spew poop all over that boy’s home.

Now this is where the story is going to get a little gross. I will edit as much as  I can, but honestly there is little I can do when trying to explain the side effects of Giardia. About two months ago we started to notice that Scioscia had what can only be described as a leaky-bum. You would pick her up and there she blows. Needless to say, it was gross. At first we cut down on the wet food she was eating in the morning, then we though maybe it was her regular food so we invested in a very expensive all-natural cat food, the breaking point was one afternoon that found Todd and me outside, rubber gloves on, ready to try and clean her anal glands. Do you know how hard it is to find the anal glands on cat Scioscia’s size? Alas, we were exhausted with trying to figure out what was making our cute kitty a walking pooper dispenser. We called the vet…
Now let me just say, I consider myself a capable person, but sometimes when faced things such as, oh well maybe if the vet handed me a bill for $170 dollars to run all these tests so they could find what was wrong her so that they could charge another $100 dollars for treatment, I get a little nervous. I want to help my poor kitty and this person who has much more knowledge about the situation than me is telling me I must do all these tests, I want to belive them! So what does a girl do? She calls her husband. Thirty minutes later Todd has a handle on the situation they only ran one test and found exactly what was causing Poop-Gate 2010. This little jerk right here, goes by the alias Giardia lamblia.

Know why he is smiling at you? Because he knows that you are going to spend countless hours scrubbing poop drippings from you floor, taking your cat to vet every other week  for a $20 a pop Giardia Snap Test and basically pulling your hair out and cursing his existence. This little sucker spends all his time in the digestive track taking all the nutrients from food and leaving nothing but slush behind. No solids in a kitty’s tummy, not a pretty thing. I think it is safe to say he is the biggest jerk of the parasite world.
The treatment was just as bad. The first medicine was liquid form in a syringe. Not that hard to give a cat. Then after the second snap test that showed she still had the parasite, we pulled out the big guns, Metronidazole. For two weeks twice a day I had to try and force a pill down little Scioscia’s throat and let me tell you, apparently this antibiotic is the worst tasting thing in the whole world. It didn’t matter what we tried to hide it in, she would find it and spit it out. Then if got moist? Oh boy, all the bets were off. It was so frustrating to me I ended up in tears a few times. Finally we went in for our third test where she was given a clean bill of health. There was a celebration like never before in the Jaramillo’s house. We cheered “No Giardia!!! No diareah!!! No more leaky bum!!!!”
Now if this were a fairy tale that would end with “and mom, dad, kitty and kitty’s bum lived happily ever after,” but this is real life and I just recently came to discover metronidazole only works about 40%-70% of the time and Giardia, being the P.O.S it is, can EASILY come back.
Cut to this week where Todd picks up Scioscia only find she left a lovely little present on his shirt. So now we are back to square one of this battle of good and evil. This time I am prepared though. I spent countless hours on the web finding alternative treatments that won’t brake the bank. There are three really good ones that I am going to try, cost combined they equal about one vet trip so I don’t feel like I am risking too much.  I ordered the first one off Amazon and it should be shipping to our house right now.
So pull out chair and put on your comfy pants, we might be here for a while. I will come back and tell you how well it is working and if not we will move onto the next.
Also I want to bring to your attention the fact, that if you made it this far, you have read an entire blog entry about my cat’s butt…
Til next time!
-Todd and Heidi

Jaramillo Pizzaria on a Saturday morning

First off, GO USA!!!! We are just relaxing around the house watching the USA play Ghana in the World Cup. On second though, relaxed isn’t really how I would describe Todd right now.

I was feeling really inspired this morning for breakfast. I started to make a grocery list for our inevitable market trip this weekend and discovered how many half-eaten breakfast foods I had in the fridge. Todd and I are doing the diet thing and the stuff we take in the morning to help suppress our appetites requires that you don’t eat for 3 hours after taking it, this way it can fully be digested. So during the week all our breakfasts have to be easy to pack and re-heat. Eggs and bacon just don’t cut it. I remembered seeing a recipe for a breakfast pizza online and decided that would be best way to keep from wasting food. This is what I had in the fridge; flour in the freezer waiting to go in a canister, cheese nearing its sell-by-date, country gravy from the biscuits and gravy I made last Saturday, green onions from the farmers market that were crying to used, cage-free eggs and the last few strips of a package of bacon. This was going to be good.
First off I had to make some pizza dough. Now, I ended up making 2 batches because if there is something that 100% suck at, it is getting my yeast to activate and my dough to rise. But for the sake of my image, we will just pretend I made one.

Am I the only one who loves the smell of yeast? I will tell you after the first failed attempt at getting my yeast to activate I did a Youtube search to actually see the process and how it should look. The second attempt worked so much better. I didn’t waste my first dough though, it is chilling in the fridge so it might be pizza for dinner this week.
After my yeast got “foamy,” I mixed in my flour, olive oil and salt. Some people like to knead their bread by hand, I have a killer yellow Kitchenaide mixer that came with a bread hook…

What is the point of Christmas presents if you are not going to use them right? I probably let it mix for eight minuets, I really wasn’t paying attention because I was cleaning up. My mom’s voice is with me all the time when I cook, “Clean as you go Heidi and it will be easier end the end.”
Then it was letting the dough raise time ie. Heidi needs to keep herself busy for a while because she is incredibly impatient and won’t stop poking and staring at the dough. I put my dough outside on a chair in the sun, if I live in a place where it is 90 degrees by 9:40 am, I am going to take full advantage of its helping dough raise abilities.  By this time I wasn’t the only impatient person in the house, some over members were starting to get antsy  for breakfast.

I cooked my bacon and eggs while the bread finished raising. I probably could have let it go longer, but I got over waiting and figured I would just have a thin-crust pizza instead. The gravy went on first, then the egg, chopped bacon, green onion and finally the cheese. Maybe a little different from normal pizza makeup, but I worried the gravy and cheese so close could create cheesey-gravy soup. Not what I was going for.

Into the oven it went, 500 degrees for about 15 minuets. I set the timer for 10, but then Todd wanted to shower really quickly, so I let it go another 5. Here is the finished product.
Suck it cold cereal.

It was incredible and extremely filling.

All the best parts of hearty breakfasts in one single bite. Incredible.
Here is the blog I got the recipe from. They just put bacon, cheese and then crack the eggs right over the pizza. I got the gravy idea from some breakfast pizzas my sisters and I used to eat from Schwan’s when we were little.
I hope everyone has a great weekend. I have laundry begging for attention, but can’t seem to remove myself from the couch.
-Mrs.J

Product Review aka don’t waste your time or money

So remember all of that hard work we put into our backyard a few months ago? The whole day we spend digging, planting, watering and basically dying in the heat? You remember, the day we gave our mothers of gift of doing manual labor for Mothers Day! Remember how excited I was for our new backyard, to sit and enjoy the trees and grass? I must have been confused when I asked for grass because all we have right now is a lovely area of dirt encompassed by a lawn border.


I am telling you now, do not waste your money on this product. It does nothing that it said it would.
We chose EZ Seed because at the time it seemed like a better bang for our buck. The heat had already started to descend on Phoenix and this was supposed to grow in harsh climates with little water. We even called the 1-800 number to ask how best to plant the grass. Then we watered according to the package. For a bout 2 weeks straight we went out every day to check for signs of little grown. After about one month we started to see happy little blades of grass poking up…but only in one spot…and then they died. Don’t ask me how, but now there is lush grass growing OUTSIDE of the dirt lawn area!!! I wouldn’t even give this stuff 1 star. It was a waste of money and we ended up missing our window to plant grass.
Now let me just say that even though this product caused many a days of hair-pulling, I really was impressed with the company Scotts itself.  We decided at the very last minuet to pull the empty seed bags out of the trash and cut the proof of purchase off, just in case it didn’t grow. Scotts claimed to have a “no quibble” guarantee, and after spending $160 on the seed we didn’t want to take any chances. When the only grass that had grown started to die, Todd was promptly on the phone with Scotts. They were 100% true to their word and said to just send in the barcodes and they would process us a check. We got our rebate in the mail this week. Even though I would never buy EZ Seed again, I would absolutely buy from Scotts again. I give their company 4 stars for giving us our money back and being nice about it!
Summer if officially here in Arizona, 111 degrees is not conducive to growing grass and I don’t want to put in sod since we would have to just tear it up when we put in a pool (hopefully) this year. I guess it is a dirt oasis at House of Jaramillo for a little longer. Call us wishful thinkers, we still faithfully water our little patch of dead grass everyday. I need a miracle of biblical proportions!
-Mrs.J

My New, Hot and Saucy Personal Trainer…

…also known as my incredibly athletic husband! Todd and I have finally started to hit the gym! Okay correction, I finally have gotten my tush in gear and started going to the gym with Todd.
I have been meaning to do it since we moved in together, our HOA includes a pretty nice gym. I have just been super lazy after my last year of school. During the fall semester I was busy planning my wedding and during the spring semester I was finishing up my classes, working 32 hours a week and doing sometimes another 30 hours at my internship with Lost Our Home. By the time summer rolled around I was spent. I have been much more content playing wifey and making my home than running on the treadmill. Alas, the excuses have run out and I can’t blame school or work on being lazy.
Our biggest goal in playing gym goers is to get healthy. I don’t have a certain amount of pounds I want to drop or a pant size I want to fit, I just want to be active again. I always feel like I have more energy and watch what goes into my body more when I am working out. We also are working towards being healthy for when we decide to bring our future kiddos into the world. I figure if I am shape before I have a baby, it will be easier to get back into shape after the baby.
I am going to try to be much better at updating House Of Jaramillo, no lazy girl excuses any more. Until then, I will be in the gym.

-Mrs. J

Getting to Know You

So last night Todd and I both learned something new about each other. We have been a couple for five years and last night discovered that both of us have a love for Ginger Ale!


Now this may not seem like that big of a deal, but I thought I knew everything about him. I thought his favorite drink (which it is) was Pepsi and I though he probably would think Ginger Ale was gross so I never bought it when went shopping. Well this week I came down with an allergy induced cold and my sweet husband was nice enough to stop Walgreens and get some heavy duty decongestant for me.  I had only been drinking water and was craving something a little carbonated but not too sweet and Ginger Ale just sounded like it would hit the spot. When he got home with my meds and the soda, Todd took one out and told me how much he loved Ginger Ale. He just never got it because he didn’t think I liked it.
I know it probably is a silly little thing, but I was just so amazed that there were still things about him I am learning. I think when you get so far into a relationship, sometimes you forget to keep getting to know that person. I am going to really enjoy when we have been married for 20 years and I am still finding out little things about him.
What is something you found out about your significant other that you never knew that surprised you?

A Litte Hard Work...

I think it would be impossible for me to stress how blessed Todd and I are to have families who are willing to spend Mother’s Day helping us put in landscaping! Thank you Mamma J, thank you Mamma McLarty, Dad, Laura and Katie. You were all a LIFESAVERS!!!
So Todd and I decided to use our wedding money towards doing some landscaping. At first we had planned to just wait until we put in a pool, but after talking to a guy at the Nursery who told us we could landscape up to two years before doing a pool, we decided to finally put our large backyard to use.

We purchased the Bonanza package and ended up with; two 24 gallon Queen Palms, four 12 gallon Queen Palms, two Pygmy Palms, three Cape Honeysuckles, two Hibiscus , two Orange Jubilees and two Ruellias. We also purchased some grass seed separately.
The nursery came and planted all of tress, but to save money we took on the task of installing a drip system ourselves.

On Mother’s Day weekend Todd’s mom and my whole family came over and spent all day Saturday digging trenches and laying tubing. It was a long hot day, but we got it done and now Todd and I can actually enjoy spending time our in our backyard. We even ended up buying some patio furniture, just to really be able sit outside and enjoy it. I predict that most summer evenings are going to spent grilling and enjoying the Arizona summer. Even the girls like it!

Now we are really motivated to save money and get that pool put in…
We will keep you updated on how the grass grows!
The Mr. & Mrs.