Happy Easter

Dream Easter Basket

I gave up candy for lent and stuck to it! I wish could gorge myself tomorrow, but know that isn't a good idea. If I do decide to have some candy, it will more than likely be a handful of black jelly beans if there are any around (which I doubt since we are staying home) and I don't think the Easter Bunny has shopped for anything. Anyway, if I could create my dream Easter basket and eat all of it, this is what would be in it and then I would be in bed sick.

E. Brach's Black Jelly Bird Eggs - licorice chewy and so yummy.

A. Cadbury Creme Eggs - something weirdly fun about these.

S. White Easter Bunny - I always got one as a kid.

T. Cadbury Mini Eggs - hard shell over Cadbury chocolate, so delicious.

E. Brach's Marshmallow Eggs - all sugar outside with marshmallow inside.

R. Reece's Peanut Butter Egg - Chocolate and Peanut Butter is a marriage made in heaven.

Thanksgiving Long Weekend Recap

It all began with baking…isn’t that how every good time starts?

I made a pumpkin spice cake (recipe here) on Tuesday night along with 4 pastry crusts for pies so everything was ready for when my Mom and Dad arrived as my Mom is the pie master. We picked them up at the airport on Wednesday late morning and had a nice lunch and moved the party to my house where the baking continued. My Mom made a pumpkin, a pecan and an apple pie while I prepped the insides of the pies, she rolled out the crusts and put them together. When the pies were done we headed downtown to check them in to their hotel and off to dinner at Villa Romano for one of the best pizzas in town.

Thursday morning I rose early so I could make some cream cheese brownies and the frosting for the pumpkin spice cake. Once everything was done it was time to get ready and head down to Robin and Kenny’s for Thanksgiving Dinner and what a nice dinner it was. Two kinds of turkey (one roasted, one smoked), a ham and ALL the sides you could ever ask for. There were about 15 of us and we all sat down to eat together which was really nice and is really hard to pull off, so bravo to the Garrison’s as I know it was a lot of hard work. After the meal, there was football to be watched, dishes to be rinsed and desserts to be prepped. Kenny went all out and made a cheesecake that not only had a toffee bottom, but had pecan pralines and chocolate ganache on top! We carefully laid out the desserts under the watchful eyes of all the kids and dug right in. This was one of the best Thanksgivings I have had in California. Both the food and the fellowship were top notch.

Friday morning, I had an appointment to get my haircut so we took it kind of slow in the morning. After my haircut we went and picked up Mom and Dad at their hotel and hung out in my neighborhood. We had lunch at Liberty Café (great turkey cobb salad) and then went to my house to watch the Red Wings and Bruins game we recorded from earlier in the day. We all walked down to Emmy’s Spaghetti Shack for dinner, which was delicious as always.

Saturday (Tim’s Birthday!) we got an early start and drove up to Sterling Winery in the very north of the Napa Valley and rode the gondola through the trees up to the winery. The view was exceptional, the fall colors on the floor of the valley were like an autumnal patchwork quilt full of burnt red, deep mustard and everything in between. After the wine tasting we went to St. Helena to walk the shops and have lunch at Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen. We made a stop at the Bike Shop after lunch and our friend Brain was working so it was a nice surprise to see him and in his element (surrounded by bikes). After fighting the traffic during the long ride home I was wiped out so we called it a day.

Sunday I needed to rest a bit. I got my nails done in the morning and ran errands in the afternoon. Before I knew it, it was time to get ready for dinner. We had Tim’s Birthday Dinner at Wayfare Tavern (Tyler Florence’s restaurant). It was amazing to say the least. We are so lucky to live in the Bay Area, a food mecca. I swear every time my parents come to visit, we have a list of places we have to go and eat. This meal was one of the best I have had in a long time, from the hot popovers once we were seated and the handcrafted cocktails to the sweet ending to the meal. Top notch.

Mom and Dad flew home on Monday morning and I went back to work, ready to start another week. It was a such a nice visit and a great Thanksgiving. Hope you all had a great holiday weekend as well.

Happy Easter to you!

Easter Basket

Today, I got an Easter Basket (bag) from Miss Wendy. It was waiting on my desk for me when I got back from the Chiropractor this morning; what a nice surpise.

I must say...someone knows me very well. How cute is the star of the photo shoot? His plumage is killing me, hilarious!

Happy New Year - Highs and Lows

Highs and Lows of 2010

Highs:

• Got studio space and made some nice books
• Angela moved back to California!
• I got to see Emily 3 times this year!
• I got to see Andy 2 times this year!
• I got to meet my Grandmother's Sister Lynn in New Mexico and my Mom's Cousin and his family.
• Beach House!
• I got to visit with Sara and Aurora from NZ twice!
• Work trip to Austin, even though it was work, it was fun - got to visit Raquel and August.
• Started consistent ballet class at ODC

Lows:

• Family home sold in Michigan
• Peanut passed away
• Final and Official letter regarding discontinuation of adoption was sent (we had no choice, they told us there was no agreement in sight between US and Vietnam adoptions - either keep paying to keep things updated with no end in sight or pull out, ech...)
• Pulled my sartorius muscle - very painful and took a loooong time to heal.
• Tim got laid off after 9 1/2 years at his job - right before Thanksgiving
• Due to the above - ballet has been cut out of the budget
• Brent Cyr passed away
• No real vacations this year where I could totally unplug

Happy Easter

Hot Cross Buns

I had to make them this year. I could taste them just thinking about them on Thursday, their yeasty, spicy, fruity, bready goodness. Not familiar with Hot Cross Buns and their background, click here. Some of the superstitions around them are pretty interesting. I guess I was supposed to make them on Good Friday, but would have been up all night due to the lengthy rising time in my old, cold, drafty flat. I literally have to rig a system for dough to rise in my house, but it works, just takes a little longer (about 20 mins) then the recommended rising time on most recipes.

After some research online there are many different recipes out there and various methods of putting the cross on the bun, I used icing on mine with lemon zest in it. I prefer my Mom's recipe so I called her and she read it to me over the phone (I altered it just a bit). Once cooled and ready to eat, I slowly took a bite and I was transported back to my childhood, suddenly I was sitting at my parent's kitchen table at Easter time surrounded by family. Its so nice when a flavor can assist in time travel, thanks Mom. Tim had not ever had a Hot Cross Bun and ate two right off the bat, I guess I likes them! I will have to make them every Easter now - a new tradition. Note to self, next year, take Good Friday off, go to Mass and make Hot Cross Buns.

It is amazing that such simple ingredients can turn into such a delicious treat.

Want to make them yourself? Here is my recipe.

Hot Cross Buns
1 Cup Milk* (Scalded)
1/2 Cup Butter*
1/2 Cup Sugar
1 pk. Active Dry Yeast
1 Egg*
4 Cups All Purpose Flour
1/4 tsp. Salt
3/4 Cup Raisins
1/4 Cup Currants
1/4 tsp. Cinnamon
1/4 tsp. Nutmeg
1/4 tsp. Allspice
1 Tbls Orange Zest

1. Pour scalded milk over butter and sugar, stir to dissolve sugar and melt butter and cool until luke warm.
2. Add yeast and egg - mix well
3. Slowly add flour and salt (reserve 1 Tbls. flour to dust fruit)
4. Add spices and fruit to mixture
5. Knead until dough comes together and is smooth and elastic
6. Turn dough into buttered bowl, cover and rise approx. 1 hour (until doubled)
7. Punch down dough (my Mom's favorite part)
8. Turn dough out onto floured board
9. Shape into 15 even sized buns and place into a buttered 9" x 13" pan
10. Cover and rise for 30 minutes until puffy and all buns are touching each other
11. Bake at 375 degrees for 10 minutes then lower heat to 350 degrees and bake 10-15 minutes until golden brown.
12. Remove from oven and cool.

Icing:
1 1/3 Cup Powdered Sugar
1 1/2 tsp. Lemon Zest
1/2 tsp. Lemon Extract
1-2 tsp. Milk*

Mix until smooth and pipe or spoon over buns in a cross shape.

* - you can use rice or soy milk (I used rice), butter alternatives (I do use real organic butter) and egg replacer (egg beaters, not powdered egg replacer - I used a local organic egg).

Enjoy!

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Happy Valentine's Day

Easy Valentine's Day Gift for Your Man

Here is a quick and easy and somewhat inexpensive way to treat your man to something special on Valentine's Day.
Cover a 6 pk cardboard carrier with colored paper (my man can handle pink plus I didn't have red). You can write on it, add XO's, hearts, etc. If you are super creative with the computer, you could design your own beer label (I did not have time for this and figured this is going to be recycled anyway).
Purchase mixed bottles of beer that you know he has been wanting to try or might enjoy.
Add funny little sayings with key beer words on each bottle for example....

• Kiss me...I'll kiss you bock
• Let's Celebrator together (if you use Celebrator beer, I had to because of the cute charm on it!)
• I'm nutty for you
• Hoppy Valentine's Day

You get the point, I am sure you can come up with better sayings than these.
My plan is to get up early on Sunday and leave this on his bedside table so when he wakes it is there, the only problem that may arise is the little fuzzy blue monster that lives with us may be very tempted by the charm and the little flags around the bottles.

Happy February - Fabulous Find

Just went to the John Derian site and this is the home page - I LOVE it!!!!

I know I have posted about John Derian before, I super love his stuff and this little Valentine's Day themed collection makes me swoon!

Awesome!

Photo by Aga Ines

While catching up on my blog reading, I came across this lovely photo posted on Twig and Thistle.

So smart and super cute!

Highs and Lows of 2009

I love this postcard from 100 years ago, thought I would post it today...

Pretty awesome year 2009 was - here is my annual High/Low list.

HIGHS:

• OBAMA!
• I made a lof of books!
• Juiced a LOT of lemons with Robin and laughed a TON during the process.
• Started Manic Monday posts - I have so much fun creating these.
• Easter in Michigan eventhough I was there for something sad, it was nice to be there.
• Greece
• "Meet me on the veranda" - nights that lasted into the morning with Christina and Angela
• Lots of beach time with Tim
• 35th Birthday weekend in Santa Cruz with Tim
• Made my 600th post on this blog!
• Beach House Weekend!
• Malta
• Gozo
• Malta - Mom, family, food, fun, sun, sea, wine...
• Malta - meeting Ilene from "An American in Malta" blog
• Sara and Cam's wedding - getting to meet Aurora
• Tim's Birthday celebration
• Ice Skating
• Advent Calendar attempt (better luck next year, we feel off the chain midway through)
• Christmas in Michigan

LOWS:

• Aunt Mary passed away
• Guruji passed away
• Michael Jackson passed away
• ER Visit when I cut the back of my foot
• Loud upstairs neighbor situation continued
• Diagnosed with asthma and an "acute cat allergy"
• Adoption process in general

Looks like the highs outweigh the lows, that is what I like to see. If you know of more lows don't tell me, I have obviously already let them go! I traveled a LOT this past year, ate a lot of great food and spent time with a lot of wonderful people and made a few new friends as well.

Any resolutions?
I don't have much, I generally make them on my birthday for the upcoming year. I do know that this year I am going to spend more time being productive making books and writing by booking time on my calendar for it and spend less time just hanging out at home doing nothing (God willing of course).

Christmas Recap

What a nice little hiatus - went by way too fast but it was just lovely. All flights were on time and security leaving Detroit to come back to San Francisco was a breeze (maybe because it was so early in the morning when we left).

Here is a rundown of our holiday events...

Christmas Eve -

8 PM early to the airport to get parked and shuttled, went through security (no lines), ate dinner (Chinese Food, everything else was closed) and waited at the gate for our flight to board. 11:15 PM plane departed (on time)

Christmas-
Landed in Chicago at 5:50 AM (that is 3:50 AM for us West Coasters) walked to the gate and waited for flight to Detroit. Arrived a little early in the D and Dad came to pick us up - super easy without having checked our bags.

Had breakfast when we got "home" - Mom made cinnamon rolls, scrambled eggs and fruit salad followed by many cups of coffee. We exchanged gifts with Mom and Dad (just the four of us) and then Tim and I had to take a nap before Emily and Mat showed up. We slept for about an hour and a half. I set the table and watched a little TV until Emily and Mat showed up. We exchanged gifts with them and then went down in to the basement to eat a wonderful turkey dinner with all the fixins'. It was so delicious, there is nothing like Mom's cooking if you ask me. After dinner we sat around, Emily and I watched her "Sing Along Songs" video from when she was a toddler and sang all the songs. We all had some dessert and coffee and then played cards for a bit (Emily, you owe me 90 minutes of my life back, ha ha!). The night seemed to go by way too fast and before I knew it, I was so tired and needed to hit the sack so Tim and I went to bed.

December 26 -
Slept until about 9 AM, had the BEST bagels ever for breakfast (this is a Michigan must have when I am in town). Bagels are NOT even close to what they are back home out here on the West Coast. Believe me on this one. Watched "Christmas in Connecticut" and waited for Emily and Mat to get up since we were planning on going to lunch. At about 1:00 PM, they came upstairs and Tim and I went to lunch with them at Anita's Kitchen for some awesome Middle Eastern food. After lunch we went to Trader Joe's so Mat could see some of his old coworkers and then went to a sporting store so I could get a Red Wings sweatshirt. That evening my brother Andy and his girls Veronica and Violet came over for dinner. We had a ton of fun! I wish I lived closer so we could spend more time together, but I guess distance is what sometimes makes the time we can spend together so precious. My Mom again made a large dinner, lasagna, salad, garlic bread, vegetables, Maltese bean salad, etc., etc., etc. The meal was followed by a million kinds of cookies and left over pie from Christmas night and peppermint ice cream! I played with the girls until it was time for them to leave around 9:00 PM. We all just hung out at home the rest of the night because we had to get up super early since my parents were leaving as well as us in the morning.

December 27 -
4:00 AM (1 AM for West Coasters) - get up and leave for airport at 4:30 PM. Drive on ice covered roads and get ready for a line at security due to recent events at Detroit Metro Airport. Security was a breeze, the only real line (which was totally disorganized) was the line my parents were in to check their bags before their flight out. Mom and Dad departed on their flight at 7:10 AM and Tim and I went to get breakfast and then left at 8:50 AM, we arrived at 11:00 AM in San Francisco. We have a tradition that when one or the both of us lands at SFO, we go to lunch or dinner at Celia's Mexican Restaurant, so that is what we did. After that, we went home and of course, BayLee gave us the business about not being around, but he had fun with his cat sitter who popped in to feed him each day. We took long naps on Sunday afternoon and took Monday off work so we could sleep in and rest, I was happy with that decision.

Hope you all had a great holiday!

I'll be home for Christmas

I'll be home for Christmas
You can count on me
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents under the tree

We leave tonight, to go home for Christmas. I have not been home for Christmas since 1995 (I moved out here in the summer of 1996). We may not be sleeping on the plane in the hopes that we may see Santa and his sleigh out the window. Yes, we have fully reverted back to little kids since we are going to my parents house for Christmas.

We arrive early Christmas morning in Chicago and then transfer and will get to Detroit mid-morning. We have Christmas Day and Saturday in Michigan and then leave on Sunday morning back to the Bay Area. My parents leave on Sunday morning as well they are in search of sunnier skies, warmer weather and hopefully a new home! This very well could be the last Christmas in the family home - bittersweet, I have not yet wrapped my head around it.

Of course Tim will have to go to Athen's Coney Island while we are there for one of their World Famous Red Hot Coney Dogs, we will watch a Red Wings game (on TV), and will also be drinking Vernor's and eating Better Made Potato Chips!

Boarding passes are printed, we are not checking bags, we just need to get to the aiport late tonight, park and get to the gate. Please pray for clear weather, a smooth flight and no delays!

What a week!

This past week went flying by!
Here is a breakdown of events:
Monday =
Work half day and volunteer with 22 other coworkers at the San Francisco Food Bank from 12:30 - 3:30. Our project was repackaging rice into affordable packages for the community that uses the food bank or one of its many other pantries around the city. It was super fun and the time flew by. I was scooping rice one one side of the bin and my boss was on the other and we had contests during the afternoon to see who could get closest to a pound scooping with the left hand, 10 small scoops and one legged. The Food Bank had music on so we were all rocking out. It was a wonderful afternoon and a great opportunity for me to get photos of my coworkers in hairnets!

Tuesday =

Work until about 6 PM, drop some things off at one of the VP's homes (that she forgot), and then pick up Tim to go to Target and run errands. Got home around 9 PM and then went to bed.

Wednesday=

Work at my desk a couple hours in the morning and then start to transform one of the meeting rooms (creative space) into a winter wonderland. I had planned a sit down lunch for 100 people for our holiday party, so I had my work cut out for me. I had help from Wendy and Aya and the decorations were done within a couple hours. Rentals arrived and we started setting up tables, dressing the tables with crisp white clothes and rolling silverware in festive red napkins. Plants arrived and were placed on the tables along with a long ribbon running down the middle. The only thing missing was the chairs, which were coming later in the day.

I stayed at the office until the chairs arrived at about 6:40 PM and decided I would see how many I could set up by 7:00 PM and got the entire room done except for a little row of tables that we were going to finish in the morning. I got home around 8 PM and crashed.
This is how I left the room on Wednesday night.

Thursday=

Work for a hour or so, set up last couple tables and AV (I projected a yule log on the wall). Set up tables for the buffet, chafing dishes were set and all we needed was the catering. Catering arrived and the dishes were filled with a wonderful holiday meal, turkey, mashed potatoes, stuffing, Brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes, salad and cranberry sauce. Everyone lined up and filled their plates and made their way into the room for lunch. We actually ran out of seats! I was really happy about that since last year about 1/3 of the office showed up.

After the meal, I made a couple of announcements, appreciations and then we moved on to the Yankee Gift Swap. We had 53 people in the swap this year! They way it works is everyone gets a number, number one starts and picks a gift and opens it. Number 2 picks a gift and opens it and then can decide if they want to keep it or take the number 1 gift, this repeats through the entire line of people and then number 1 gets to go again to pick from all of the opened gifts or the can keep what they got. I was number 26 and opened a nice espresso maker for the stove top - I knew this was going to get taken from me so I decided to steal a gift I knew no one else wanted, but I loved it! The Pope John Paul II water/drink dispenser that number 1 had opened. He sits on my desk now, but will soon move to another location or be brought out at parties and could use a little more spirit. People come by my office to see it and have a few laughs. I love the Pope, so to me, I just like having him around. It is pretty crazy though and gets a lot of laughs around the office. People laugh at how proud I am of it and the fact that I actually took it from someone else. You should have heard the room chanting "Pope, Pope, Pope, Pope...."when each person had an option to steal. It was a great gift exchange and everyone went back to work afterwards.

I was at work until 6 PM - spent the rest of the afternoon cleaning up, packing up leftovers for the local food bank to pick up with Wendy and Aya and directing some guys who helped fold up the tables. We got everything pretty cleared up by the time we left for the day.

Friday=
Chiropractor appointment and boy did I need it! Went to the office and made sure all of the rented stuff (plates, glasses, silverware, linen, tables and chairs) were all set to be picked up. Got caught up on work, called Emily (it was her Birthday) and left on time for once this week.

It was a fun and busy week - next week will be a little more mellow and I can get caught up and start working on my next big event that I plan each year...The All*Star Awards Dinner, this will be my 9th year planning it.

Creative Neighbor

While walking to my car this morning, I saw this on a neighbors door. I love it, plus its trash day and what better what to celebrate that and the holiday season than creating a wreath that sort of encompasses both occasions.

Advent Chain

The above photo is my paper chain advent calendar.
Very simple, easy to make and no cost at all. Just cut 25 strips of paper (Dec 1-25) and write an activity on each one. I planned my activities according to our calendar which already had some events on it, which helped fill in some space. I stuck the strips together with zots brand glue dots, but you could use a glue stick or tape. I used whatever paper I had around and happened to have a dark green and used a silver pen to write the day's activity down.

As for hanging your chain, when I was a kid, I think we used to adhere the last chain link (the 25th) to a recycled Christmas Card from the year before and just hang it high up and as we got closer we moved it down so us kids could reach. I didn't have anything like that, so I just draped it around something up high (on top of an armoire).

I have a feeling I am going to be on my own for some of the events I had planned. Tim plays tennis in a league and his matches sometimes conflict with the advent calendar (like tonight). So, today's activity - Hayes Street Holiday Street Fair may be attended by just me OR I might be more relaxed about it and just go home and have time to myself while he is out, which is very tempting. It has been super cold here and going home, turning on the heat, drinking some tea and reading a book sounds awfully good. Ice skating again also sounds good, maybe this weekend!

First Advent Event

We started our advent calendar yesterday and our activity was to go downtown for dinner on Macy's roof (Cheesecake Factory) and look at the Macy's windows. During dinner the snow machines went on so we sort of ate outside in the snow under heat lamps - so San Francisco!

I had to take a photo from the roof looking down at Union Square (I was standing between the C and the Y in Macy's logo in the above photo), it was so festive and there was ice skating!I have been on an ice skating kick as of late. I used to skate a lot back home when I was a teen and have not been on the ice since. I have recently had a couple dreams where I have been ice skating and pick it right back up. Unfortunatly, I don't think that will be the case, eventhough my Dad said it is like riding a bike, you don't forget. We will soon find out, Tim has finally agreed to go with me and try it out. What a good sport he is.

After checking out Union Square we went to the other side of Macy's to check out their SPCA holiday windows. Every year they showcase animals that need adopted and these are a few of the fuzzy creatures we saw last night.

It was obviously nap time for them. They go back to the shelter for the night and then come back the next day. Last year they adopted 350 animals from the window alone during the month of December! So incredible! It was a great way to kick off our advent calendar.
Today's activity is to print lables for holiday cards - not super fun, but free and needs to be done.