Cold and clear

My mom and dad came for a visit last week over the New Year. We had a great time and New Years Eve we decided to take a day trip to get out of the city. It's been forever since we took a ferry anywhere, so we headed over to Port Townsend and Poulsbo but it was a killer cold day even though the sun was super bright. I must say Port Townsend is my new destination of choice- we have got to get back there this summer to explore. Here are some photos . . .

From the Ferry

The Olympic mountains looked so amazing!

She knows how to take a picture- needle in the background

See what I mean?

Mt Rainier from ferry- not it's finest moment, but it never ceases to impress

Ok, I couldn't stop taking shots of them . . .

From the peninsula- outside Port Townsend in Fort Worden State Park- loved this place!

Looking back East at Whidbey Island and the mountains on the mainland behind Whidbey

Point Wilson Lighthouse at Fort Worden

They loved climbing the rock wall surrounding the lighthouse

Stephen even got them leaping around

Mom and dad

With the girls, the Port Townsend/Whidbey Island ferry in background

My Nordics

Port Townsend has several really gorgeous houses and buildings- they had their heyday in the late 1800s

On to Scandinavian Poulsbo

Ummm . . . . delicious!!

Surrounded by amazing pastries, we all found at least one we wanted to try

Goodbye Poulsbo and the peninsula, we'll be back on a warmer day!

Thanks Mom and Dad for spoiling us, we had a great time!

Trash talking

One of Odessa's My Little Ponies got chewed up on the legs by a visiting canine a while ago. We hid it from her and she hasn't missed it much- until yesterday. She was crying about not having a pony collection anymore. I thought a damaged pony was better than no pony, so I pulled it out. Not so. Hysterics ensued. I finally calmed her down with 2 bandaids to cover the mangled hooves of the pony. Several small plastic chunks are missing.
Today in the car she was ruminating that when the dog who chewed on the pony started feeling sick, she would have to have surgery to remove the pieces from her stomach (this has been months now) and then they would take the pieces and make something else out of them (like all good plastic- it would get recycled, right?).
I had to explain that the dog probably just pooped out the pieces and they got thrown away in the garbage.
Odessa: So it would go to the compost?
Me: No, dog poop can't be composted, it would go to the garbage.
Odessa: What do they do with garbage?
Me: Ummm . . . . nothing really
Odessa: It doesn't get recycled?
Me: No.
Odessa: Where does it go?
Me: Into a big pile called a landfill or dump.
Quiet for minute . . . .
Odessa: (under her breath) Sounds like littering to me.

A few minutes after that she came around the idea of a big pile of garbage and how fun it would be to sled down it because of course it would be slippery.
And that started a whole new conversation . . .

Bean and Cheese Enchiladas

I forgot to take a picture before they were dished up. I was interested in making these for 2 reasons- homemade enchilada sauce has got to be cheaper than my favorite Trader Joes enchilada sauce and the instructions were to heat the filled tortillas and then pour the heated sauce over individual enchiladas right before serving. This is a method I have been trying at my house recently to cut down on tortilla sogginess. I will admit I cheated on the filling- I did not have the cottage cheese to blend into a nice, smooth filling and add beans to- I wanted to use rice and black beans, so I did.
I have decided if you want the recipe, I will email it to you. At least for this one- I may be more motivated next time and actually post it.
Sum up- homemade sauce isn't AS good, but it IS good and of course cheaper than my favorite kind . . . although I think Cooks Illustrated has a homemade sauce that is just as good or better, maybe I better dig that one up and do a little taste-off.

New challenge

I have lots of things I would like to do in 2011, but one of them is just silly enough to blog about. I want to make every recipe from this month's issue of Everyday Food and blog about them. Do I have time to do this? Not really. Will I do it in a month? No way. But it's high time there were some food entries on this blog.
Let the games begin.

Christmas Recap

Our community Christmas event calendar was a bit lacking this year, but oh well. We did take the girls to the Nutcracker, which was the highlight- theirs and ours. Being the penny pincher that I am, we drove clear to Enumclaw for the performance- about an hour away. It was a fraction of the price of tickets closer to town. Of course it wasn't the level of performance we would have seen in the city, but a 3 yr old and 5 yr old really don't care. The best part was watching their mesmerized faces as they sat on their knees in their seats and watched all the ballerinas. They know the Nutcracker story well, so that helped.
Other holiday notables: I had my first annual Favorite Things Christmas Party with about 15 ladies. We all picked our favorite thing under $5 and bought 3 of them. Then we drew numbers and swapped at the party- lots of fun.
The girls got to see a darn good Santa at the primary Christmas party- they loved telling him what they wanted for Christmas.

After the party, we went up into the mountains with another family in the ward to cut down our $10 Christmas tree (turns out being cheap is not always the best idea) and due to the amazing amount of snow, the blizzard conditions and the stuck nature of many vehicles surrounding our friend's truck, we were there for hours and I decided a nice Christmas tree farm is maybe the way to go next year. I had to chuckle that our friend with his small truck and chains on his tires pulled out huge truck after truck who hadn't planned and then gotten themselves in all kinds of pickles. It was fun to watch the Jeep Wranglers who were outfitted to seriously do major off-roading drive up and over huge drifts and then orchestrate all the towing and manuevering of vehicles to get us all down the mountain with trees. Stephen had to practically army crawl across the snow to pick out our tree- the mountain was so steep and the snow so deep. Not our finest tree ever, but everyone was just so happy to get out alive, we didn't care what our trees looked like one bit. Here are a few photos of the house- we have loved decorating with the pine boughs and holly from the trees in the backyard.


We attended a lovely dinner party with about 50 other people at a gorgeous home in West Seattle . . . whew- such a fine house and such fine food! And we finally hit downtown on Christmas Eve and saw the gingerbread houses at the Sheraton hotel (I almost passed out waiting in line- that was fun). The girls and I did the Seattle Center one day without dad- we breezed through the main building with Christmas stuff and spent most of our time at the Pacific Science Center.

Christmas Eve they opened pillow cases and PJs, then we headed up to Everett for a super fun night spent at the Romneys.
Lots and lots of favorite foods and got to meet some new friends too.


Christmas morning looked like this:
I got a dollhouse at a thrift store and decided I would like to furnish it with Playmobil furniture, so all the grandparents and aunts and uncles who bought for our family pitched in and purchased one or two rooms to the tune of 7 furnished rooms for the girls! They opened each room separately and we put them all together afterward. All the pieces are adorable- moving parts, lots of tiny details- note the sink full of dishes already. LOL
The other favorite gift was the long-coveted music/jewelry boxes with dancing ballerinas. However, I have listened to the same 3 bars of Swan Lake SO MANY TIMES it's kind of going to drive me nuts . . .

Christmas night we had take and bake pizzas and about 4 billion other foods with 2 other families in the ward and the missionaries- we seriously should have tried to get the whole mission zone in there to clean it up- thankfully everyone took leftovers and we were able to give the other food to a family who needed it.
Because . . . . Sunday night we had our good friends from our previous ward over for a formal dinner! Whew. It was a great dinner- they are kind of our "Seattle grandparents" and also we had our friend and real estate agent over- it's so fun to show your home improvements to the person who saw your house and yard at it's very lowest points. lol
They all spoiled us rotten with side dishes and presents- the girls got some coveted books! Hooray! To finish off the weekend we got to see our friend Hermes for a long over due visit. And that was the whirlwind that was Christmas weekend. I was DREADING this morning- Stephen going back to work and me starting my work projects again as well, but it hasn't been as bad as I thought and we have my parents visit to look forward to this week. Plus I am still listening to Christmas music- the season lives on!

All I ever need to know I learned from PBS Kids

(Ada HATES having her hair combed, hates ponytails and her super fine hair was always tangling, so last Saturday, I whacked off more than 6 inches. She loves it- she could pull off a pixie,
but maybe when she's older : )

We've had seriously horrible periods of time when my kids watch altogether too much PBS kids. Pregnancy nausea, moves, overloaded with new stay at home job . . . etc.

I've got "those kids" who will sit riveted to a TV as long as you let them- sometimes you can't get them to blink, let alone respond to you if it's on. Dangerous, I know. So thankfully, I am glad PBS tries to make their stuff educational and this is my tribute to them . . . . . and my bad parenting skills.

Stephen is often surprised by something the girls tell him at dinner or when he gets home and he used to ask me "how do they know about that?" and my response was always "PBS Kids, where do you think they learned it?"
I can't tell you how many explanations begin with me saying "remember how on Curious George/Sid the Science Kid . . . this and that happened and so that's why . . . . "
Plus I attribute Odessa's ease in picking up reading and writing comprehension to many of their literature programs.

Some funny moments that led Stephen and I to surmise that all we really need to know we learn from PBS Kids:
Odessa started using words from The Electric Company appropriately at the dinner table such as "dubious" and "fatigued". While we knew she could probably copy cat a sentence she heard, we were surprised she could also tell us the definition.
She and Ada took a tumbling class and promptly informed their teacher that the tumbling wedge was an inclined plane and made it easy to move things up and down an area- thank you Sid the Science kid.
Ada spent 15 minutes in the car the other day explaining to me that we have rubber tires and why they are so much better than the wooden wheels they used to make.
But it was after Odessa identified some Cirrus clouds while we were all driving somewhere that Stephen pounded the wheel in excitement and declared: "Our kids don't need to go to school! They learn enough from PBS kids, who needs public school?!"

What a deal!

We needed curtains for our living room- big purchase, big decision, big deal. We also have big leaks in our 33 yr old windows that needed to be blocked. Plastic on the windows needed to be covered despite the excellent plastic-ing job Stephen always does . . . .

Small business Saturday (after black Friday): Went to IKEA to check out curtains (don't judge, also visited small businesses later) - the curtains I wanted were all sold out.
Cyber Monday: Get ads from JC Penney- window treatments 60% off! Find some online I like. Stephen wisely suggests we go in and look in person.
Monday night: Fall in love with a totally different curtain: Studio Trilby design in Huckleberry color. Love. But it's only Buy one, get one 50% off- nothing like the online sale.
Tuesday morning: Check online- Huckleberry all sold out and discontinued online. Boooooo.
Tuesday afternoon: Return to Penneys to buy curtains. I am told if I wait until Wed, I can open a Penney's account and save another 20%. I put them on hold.
Wednesday night: Return to Penneys, FINALLY buy curtains. Hip hip horray.
Saturday morning: Buy curtain rod and hang curtains. Love curtains.
Sunday: Decide we would love them even more if there were 2 more panels- 4 is just a little skimpy and they are too flat.
Monday morning: Call Penneys to see if they have 2 more Huckleberry panels and if they are still on sale.

Sales person: No, they are not on that sale, but they are on a better sale now.
Me: Really? I bought 4 last week, any chance I can get the better price on those?
Sales person: Yes, if it was within 7 days we can make the change.
Me: Really? I also applied for the Penney's card to get the 20% off, any chance that would also apply? (I learned these skills from my mother. If you don't ask, you never know)
Sales Person: Umm, yes that should be ok.

Monday night: Take receipt to Penneys to buy two more panels. Turns out the new sale is 50% off! Saleswoman returns the previous four panels, rings up all six, gives me the 20% off (on ALL of them- which I was not expecting) and says: "I now owe you $.07- that will have to go back on your card."

I walk out the door with two new panels and a $.07 credit. Oh, what a joyful, joyful season.