Monday, December 8, 2008

trust me...


...it wasn't easy...

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Thanksgiving revisited - our contributions to a large meal



I loved cooking cranberry sauce. It was so easy and so satisfying to see and hear the cranberries pop and then thicken into a rich, red sauce. I am completely flabbergasted as to why anyone would use canned cranberry sauce, as it was probably one of the easiest things I have ever made. The fact that red is my favorite color made it even that much more enjoyable. Other than cranberry sauce our contributions were maple baked yams and baked beans. Contrary to the name the baked beans were cooked in a slow cooker (still can't figure that out), and as I didn't stop to think that doubling the recipe would have an effect on cooking time they turned out to be a great side dish with the leftovers.

Some lovely food, about to be cooked:
Mark was also going to make a pumpkin pie, so he started getting this together:


...but it turned out my sister had already made a pumpkin pie. As of right now it is still sitting in our fridge, waiting to be turned into something - hopefully by tomorrow! So instead Mark contributed some lovely homemade vanilla bean ice cream (as always, his best yet).
All the other food was amazing as well - my sister and Nick took care of the turkey, my mom made: deviled eggs, apple pie, spelt chocolate cake, and mashed potatoes, and Sean and Mari made delicious green beans tossed with almonds and a lime vinaigrette, creamed cauliflower, and salad with delicious homemade balsamic dressing. Needless to say, we all had plenty of food.

Unfortunately Tom couldn't join us as he had knee surgery on Tuesday, but he seems to be doing great now and even made it out with Sean and Mark to see a show at the McDonald Theatre on Friday.

But now, for what you came here for - here is a video of some of Emi's first crawling. This was taken on Thanksgiving day. Since then she is creeping all around the house and will come into visit me in the kitchen from the living room.



After the Thanksgiving festivities were over, I put out the first Christmas decoration of the year (an ornament Sen received from his Grandma last year with express directions to be very careful. He dropped it hanging it up on the tree... so now it rest safely on the candle holder, jagged edges discreetly tucked away):


and the following day our Araucana chicken laid its first green egg:


pretty great gift huh?





Tuesday, December 2, 2008

crafty crawlies

Yesterday Sen, Emi, Aya, Nicholas, and Yama were kind enough to help me search for acorns at Mt. Pisgah, an ideal place as it is an oaktree arboretum.

It was a beautiful and misty fall day, and warm enough that even a few mosquitoes were out. Mt. Pisgah is one of my very favorite places, I love how many different landscapes and ecosystems are in this one park. Unfortunately, as it is so late in the year the acorns were scarce, and I was very lucky to have the help that I did. In the end I got enough acorns, but wouldn't have minded a few more. It was even more worth it for all the beautiful things we saw:




(okay, well maybe the last picture is something only a mother could think is beautiful)


As for the acorns... I'm planning on participating in a craft fair at Dharmalya (a sustainable living center) on December 13th. It will be my first time doing anything like this, and I'm really looking forward to it, although it is stressful trying to figure out how I will have time to make enough things. The acorns will turn into Christmas ornaments, and I also have lots of other things I would like to make. For instance, Isabella:

Since this picture she has been sewn all together and need only a little more stuffing and finishing touches. I'm hoping to make several dolls, some needle-felted play foods and other random things like silk-screened baby onesies and paper lanterns.

And, in breaking news, we now have an official crawler (okay, well maybe creeper) in the funnyface family. Emi started crawling (creeping) the day before Thankgiving and has improved every day since. I thought that I had taken some video of this momentous occasion but it seems as though I just imagined it. Expect something in the next few days.





signing off,