Sliders are so precious and cute. I want to eat them up. What is it about these baby burgers that makes us love them so much, makes ME love them so much. I like to make them at home with King’s Hawaiian Dinner Rolls and ground turkey with a bit of apricot jam mixed into the meat. It will change your life. I feel a little disturbed by eating them because they are so cute. It’s like eating kittens or baby seals.

However, I went to Jack-in-the-Box with this crazy, mad-scientist, genius from our church last night to try their new slider offering. The poster on the building has three of these cutie-pie burgers stacked on top of each other like three bear cubs in a circus. They didn’t look so cute when they came in the box.

Bottom-Line – they didn’t feel so good in my stomach later. Jack stinks at sliders. I will stick with the home-made version.

I actually stole this picture from Daiana. I stole it because we unpacked our whole basket and then thought, “OH MAN, we should have taken a picture. it’s beautiful.” But this is exactly what our basket looked like with some green beans and basil too. This is a really cool thing that Erin got us into to get fresh local produce for a good deal that supports local farmers. Now I need to start cooking it. Any good recipes?

TV Notes:
The Next Food Network Star – I want Amy to win. The other two are annoying and Jag is a cheater so they eliminated him. I like Amy’s point of view – a good mixture of culinary expertise, French style, and housewife.
Hell’s Kitchen – this show is getting annoying. The people can’t even cook. Where do they choose these people from? They suck. They overcook and undercook constantly. One potential executive “chef” didn’t know what ahi was. Give me a freaking break???
Top Chef – this is the coolest cooking reality show on TV and I just discovered it. They are all actually real chefs who know what they are doing. It’s a pleasure to watch instead of being painful.

Yes, I am a little too into cooking reality shows.

I have to speak tonight in Jr High and I’m going to be exhausted by 8:00pm after being at work for 10 hours by that point. I also went to sleep last night at around 10:30pm so that’s about 3.5 hours of sleep. AAAGGGHHHH!!!!

Tonight, it was kind of like I was one of the girls at a slumber party or something. I guess that’s my life now with having a wife and two daughters!! I don’t mind. I’m glad that Bea has awesome friends who love her tons.

Yesterday, I took Grace to disneyland and we saw Guy Fieri from The Food Network. I love cooking and food and I watched the whole season when he won The Next Food Network Star.

So I see him walking by with his family at Disneyland right between the Teacups and Storybook Land – by the way, only go on Storybook Land if you want to suffer a slow and painful death. Then I recognize him and I stick my fist up like “Yes!” and I say, “Dude, I watched your whole journey and I rooted for you the whole time!” He says, “Thanks man, I appreciate it” with a seemingly genuine smile.

I am a serious dork.

Food update:
1. Eggs Benedict at the Empress with deliciously different Canadian Back Bacon.
2. High Tea at the Empress twice – tasty. Tiny sandwiches – Curry Chicken Salad, Cucumber, Carrot and Cream Cheese, and smoked salmon. Egg salad crostinis. Amazing scones and desserts.
3. Fish n Chips at a pub in Victoria called the Sticky Wicket
4. Triple Grill at the Blue Crab in Victoria – this was King Crab legs, New York Strip Steak, and a Halibut fillet all on one plate with potatoes and mixed veggies.
5. Shepherd’s Pie made by my Uncle Brian who is from England. Best I have EVER had.
6. Bacon Cheeseburger at the White Spot restaurant. A Canada exclusive.
7. Two breakfasts by my “cousin” Judy – strawberry pancakes and scrambled eggs with toast.

Tonight – ROAST BEEF AND YORKSHIRE PUDDING with all the trimmings. I can’t wait.

2. First Ever (at least for several years) Student Ministry Easter Service at Calvary Church. It was awesome!! The band rocked out some great songs like Salvation is Here, Mighty to Save, Christ the Lord is Risen Today, and Nothing But the Blood. Matt Doan and Melissa Brosch (doesn’t have a blog but should) talked about the scapegoat and brought in a live goat. It’s always fun to have live animals in church. I talked about the Empty Tomb and my experiences in Israel. I read 1 Corinthians 15 from The Message and it has a cool verse (12) that says, “And I’m not going to let that grace go to waste.” I like that phrase. I’m actually pretty unclear of what that translates directly from, but I still like it. It definitely preached. There were a ton of kids because we combined JH, HS, and College. It’s fun to have that kind of energy in the room.

3. Elevation Easter Service. We had great worship with many similar songs. Salvation is Here, Mighty to Save, Christ the Lord is Risen Today, Marvelous Light. They did The Easter Song (Hear the Bells Ringing) as a pre-service song, but unfortunately is was not in the 80s Glam Metal style that I suggested. I’m sure Victor will post more on the music. Then we had these cool Digital Short Films that we made and Pastor Dave aka P-Diddy preached out of them. Chad Ashton did a ton of the work on the videos and he is a stud. They looked cool. The audio voiceover was overly theatrical and that kind of bummed me out, but they were visually awesome. The service ended with everybody pretty pumped up on worship and all that. A good morning overall.

4. Now we are packing and getting ready to leave in the morning. The blogging might be a bit sporadic over the next week.

He is Risen…He is Risen INDEED!!

Illusionist – 5. Interesting but a bit overrated.
Hollywoodland – 4. Boring and slow.

Now we are watching Wizard of Oz with Grace. It’s her first time seeing it. She is loving it.