Packing (Part Two)

Today was my last day at work. It was sad to say goodbye, I will miss everyone that I worked with for the last 2 1/2 years! I am still working on locking down a job in San Francisco. I've had lots of interviews and done lots of over analyzing.

Now it's crunch time. We have piles and piles of boxes with tiny walk ways all over our place. Who knew you could fit so much $&@# in one apartment?!

This Is What Lunch Looks Like...

When you're packing and trying to eat up all the food in your kitchen. All you need are Ritz crackers, shredded cheese and pepperonis.

(Please excuse the horrible picture. It was taken with my Blackberry. I think I need an iPhone. Joe, are you reading this?)

Going Away Shin-Dig

Saturday night we had a small going away party at Cabaret in West Glen. Some great friends came out to say good bye and hang out.

Jordan and Luke made the trip from Cedar Falls. I'm glad we finally got to meet Luke. They're getting married in August and we're really sad we won't be able to make it, but I can't wait to see pictures!

We'll miss Cari and Adam, but we might miss babysitting Jackson more:) He's such a cutie. Cari worked with Joe and they both actually knew my brother in college. Small world!

Carly and Jordan came to see us too. It was a great time telling old college stories and remembering the great times we had. Those were the days:)

My co wokers stayed out with us all night. We should have gone to a bar that had karaoke. Jessica enjoyed the juke box maybe a little too much.

Thanks to everyone who came out Saturday night. We will really miss all of you!

Des Moines Arts Festival

Joe and I made our way downtown for the Des Moines Arts Festival at the Western Gateway Park. We kept checking the radar before we left home because it rained in the morning and the clouds were dark the whole day. Luckily the rain held off and we enjoyed the festival.

There was a lot going on. There were street performers juggling bowling pins, a jazz and wine tent, beer, wine and smoothies. Habitat for Humanity was building a house right on the street. Pretty cool!

We viewed some of the sculptures in the park. This is the art donated by John and Mary Pappajohn. It's worth a combined $40 million dollars!

Joe and I actually walked away with some art. We bought an etching of Kinnick Stadium. We saw an etching of the old stadium first, but luckily we dug a little deeper because we found one after the renovation was done. Unfortunately the print won't see a wall for a while. We do need to buy a frame first, plus it'll go straight into a box for our move.

We had been wanting to go to the Arts Festival the last couple years. We're glad we made it before we move next week.

Tonight we're going out with some friends for a going away party. Should be fun!

Archstone South Market

Hallelujah! We finally found out our living arrangements in San Francisco. We will have a roommate who will also be in the CMTP training with Joe. The apartment complex we will live at is Archstone South Market.

It’s a great location in the heart of downtown in the SOMA district. Here’s a map of the neighborhoods in San Francisco. SOMA is on the Eastern side near I-80. Crazy how we lived so close to I-80 in West Des Moines, we moved half way across the country and we're just as close to the interstate!!

And here's a map of where the apartment complex is located:

The apartment is really close to lots of neat location attractions:

• Moscone Convention Center (across the street)

• SFMOMA (1 block)

• Yerba Buena Gardens (2 blocks)

• Sony Metreon (3 blocks)

• Market Street (3 blocks)

• BART, MUNI & CalTrain stations (4 blocks)
• AT&T Park/SF Giants (4 blocks)
• Union Square (5 blocks)

Plus it has lots of great amenities.

We can’t wait to get moved in!!

(Pictures found here and here)

Lake Okoboji (Part Two)

After eating at the Dry Dock we wandered around Arnold's Park.

The tipsy house was extra tipsy.

The mirror maze was fun. Watch out Nick, don't run into the glass!

 The sunset was pretty amazing. Don't you think this picture could be framed?

On Sunday we kayaked around the dock. Well, Joe tried, but flipped the kayak. He didn't have his swimsuit on either. Good thing he took his phone out of his pocket!

Lake Okoboji (Part One)

We had a fun weekend at the lake. My parents joined us at Joe's parents house for a weekend of sun and water. Ok, maybe not so much sun. Saturday was overcast pretty much the whole day. On the bright side, none of us got sun burnt.

We spent lots of time on the boat.



We skied, wake boarded and tubed until our bodies were sore.

We drank home brewed beer. Thanks Kent and Jessica!!

More pictures to come later this week.

Happy Father's Day!

We had a great weekend in Okoboji. Happy Father's Day to two great fathers!!

 More pictures to come once I get them uploaded and edited.

Strawberry Streusel Bars with White Chocolate Drizzle

This weekend Joe and I are in charge of dessert. We have an exciting weekend planned at the lake with both my parents and Joe's parents. Now that Joe's parents have permanently moved to Okoboji we don't have many opportunities to have all of our family together. I think the last time we all got together was for pizza and beer shortly after we got engaged.

This is not the first time we've made this dessert. I brought it to work a couple weeks ago and we loved it so much we decided to make it again to bring to a friend's house. This is actually the third time we've made this dessert in less than a month. It's good enough, you won't get sick of it!

Strawberry Streusel Bars with White Chocolate Drizzle

altered from Simply Scratch

Ingredients:

• 2 cups old fashioned oats
• 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cups white sugar
• 3/4 cups light brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 cup cold butter, cut Into small pieces
• 1/2 cup strawberry jam
• 1 teaspoon lemon zest
• 2 cups strawberries, sliced
• 1/2 cup white chocolate chips

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the oats, flour, both sugars, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the chopped up cold butter and work it into the dry ingredients with your fingers or a pastry blender until the mixture looks like small crumbles. Reserve 1 cup of this mixture.

Dump the remaining crumb mixture into an un-greased 15” x 10” pan (jellyroll pan) and press it into an even crust. Bake in 350 degree oven for 12-13 minutes or until it is firm to touch.

Remove pan from oven. Warm the jam in a small sauce pan over low heat and then stir in the lemon zest. Pour and the warm jam over the warm crust and spread with a pastry brush. Spread the quartered strawberries over the crust. Sprinkle on the reserved cup of crumb mixture.

 

Return pan to 350 degree F oven and bake for another 20-25 minutes or until the crumbs on top are a light golden brown. Then remove it from the oven and let the pan cool for 1 hour. Once cooled, cut into bars.

Melt the white chocolate in a glass bowl over a pot of simmering water until just melted. With a spoon dip in white chocolate and drizzle it in thin lines over the streusel top. Serve.

 

Few Notes:

·         I used a little more than 1/2 cup of the jam, maybe 3/4 cup

·         The first two times making this I used strawberry rhubarb jam 

·         You might be able to tell in the picture above that I forgot to reserve 1 cup of  the streusel, whoops!

Packing

It's hard to pack when you still have 4 or 5 weeks left before you move. When we found out we were officially moving to San Francisco I got anxious and felt we should start packing right away. Then I realized we had so long and the chances were good we'd end up needing most of the items.

We started by going through our closets and piling up clothes to give to Goodwill. We also gathered boxes and more boxes to fill. For a while we lived with a mountain of empty boxes.

Here's to starting to really pack our apartment... I'll toast with a margarita at the lake this weekend!

Saying Goodbye To Old Friends

Our move is getting closer and closer and we've started to get together with friends for lunch or dinner to say goodbye. Tonight I had dinner with Lauren and Jacinda, both high school friends. More like elementary, middle school and high school friends.

We made up 3/4 of the seniors on our softball team. Loved those uniforms, hated that field!

This field was muuuuuch better:)

The first of many goodbyes... we'll just call them see ya laters though.

Welcome!

I've been wanting to create a blog for a while... it's finally time. Primarily this is to keep friends and family updated on what the Ellerbroek's are up to. With our move to San Francisco approaching soon we'll have plenty of things to write about and hopefully have lots of pictures to post. I hope you enjoy!