Wordless Wednesday

Uncle's House

Edward and Jennifer now have their very own apartment in Mountain View.  They've been in it for a few weeks and we finally got to visit this past weekend.  Dave and Eddie drove down on Friday morning and I took Amtrak down later that evening, after my lab meeting.  Driving takes 1.5-2 hours, depending on traffic and the train takes 3 hours.  Doubling the commute time is fine by me when I don't have to drive and I get a few uninterrupted hours of knitting and reading.

I actually spent the fist half of the train ride talking to a nice old man about various things: his work as a non-JD lawyer for a title company (he showed me some 1800s letters he's having to read through for historical information on a particular property in Sacramento), compost, how he raised his girls alone back in the 1950s because their mother "was crazy." He was one of those guys who makes puns constantly and then laughs at all his jokes.  Except he didn't just laugh, he snorted when he laughed.  It was ridiculous.  Toward the end of the line, when there weren't many people left on the train, I realized that the lady across from me was deaf.  She startled me when she tapped loudly on the table between us to get my attention while I was reading and snarfing down my Chipotle burrito.  She tried to write "San Jose?" with her finger on the table, but I couldn't figure out what she meant.  Finally I found a pen in my backpack and asked her to write it again.  Since she can't hear the announcements and there's aren't clearly posted signs in the Amtrak stations (as on BART), she had no idea where we were.  Later, I'd show her my phone's Google Map image so she'd know. 

Eddie was asleep by the time I got to the apartment (thank goodness for 2 bedrooms!) so us adults got to have a quiet, yummy dinner.  Then we set up our blow up and pull-out sofa beds so we could go to sleep. 

The next morning we had breakfast and then Edward, Eddie, and I went to Dyani's to pick up Batiste.  They needed a sitter that day while they were at work.  How perfect that we were in the area and wanted to play with Batiste anyway!

He looks so small in the big boy seat!

We took the kiddos to Happy Hallow park and zoo in San Jose.  It was a bit cold and overcast, but so much fun.

Is it weird that I think Dave is super hot when pushing a stroller?

Batiste thought this car was pretty fun.

Us checking out the capybara...I want one badly.

Walking man is getting fast!

Sand is fun! Especially when there are dinosaur fossils in it!

The boys didn't care much for the animals but LOVED the play structure.  Batiste also spent a LOT of time playing in the landscaping mulch.

Batiste spent about 30 minutes picking up mulch and making little piles.

Forget the zoo! Let's make mulch piles (you can see three here).

Eddie went on his first roller coaster several times.  Oh man, I can't wait to take this kid to Disneyland.

There's a 2 story wood-and-rope play structure there and both boys seemed to love it.  Even though Batiste is just mastering walking, he climbed up the nets and stairs like a pro (going down required some help, however).  We had 4 adults and 2 kids and we were all playing tag-team and zone defense on that play structure...the boys can really move FAST!

My little tight rope walker!

Go Batiste! Go!

He lost a shoe, but it didn't slow him down!

Happy boys, happy Auntie

Having skipped naps, the boys were weary and a little cranky (at least mine was) by the time we left.  Batiste loathes being in a car seat so be screamed the whole way back to Mountain View but Eddie zonked right out.  Dave dropped us off at the grocery store, where I carried Batiste in the Ergo (he fell asleep immediately and I'd forget I was carrying him until he'd occasionally sigh).  We bought all kinds of delicious stuff for dinner: ham, asparagus, potatoes au gratin fixings (with mushrooms and jalapeno!)...and of course, strawberries and whipping cream for dessert.  Edward and I walked home so Batiste could keep sleeping a while longer. 

Sleepy tired!

Back in the kitchen, Jennifer, Edward, and I got to work cooking.  Alex and his friend came over, and later, Dyani and Brice.  Most of us changed into swimming suits for a quick hot tub dip while dinner cooked in the oven. 

Dinner buffet!

Once dinner was ready, we all squeezed around their kitchen table, sitting on a variety of chairs: office, beach, folding church chairs from the 1920s, and an overturned Rubbermaid tote.  (Jennifer's furniture is en-route to them from her parents' home in New York...by our next visit the house will be fully furnished.  Not that we minded one bit this way.)  Dinner was super good, the only thing missing was a pair of quiet toddlers...maybe next time.  =)

At some point that night Dyani and Brice (with an Ergo-ed Batiste) began teaching Edward and Jennifer how to salsa dance.  I'd thought that there wasn't enough wine in the world to force Edward into dancing, but apparently there is (plus Dyani can be very convincing).  This whole time Eddie was up and running around, like a small mad man.

 

After dessert was made, eaten, and the kitchen cleaned up, I looked at the clock--eek, it was nearly 11pm!--and decided to get Eddie to bed.  The good thing is that having him stay up late means he'll sleep in late, too.  We are VERY lucky to have a child who sleeps a given number of hours and not by the clock or sun. 

Sunday morning I rolled out of bed at 9:20am to take a shower.  I don't even think anyone else was up!  After I got dressed, I discovered that Dave and Eddie were snuggling in Eddie's bed.  Once Auntie and Uncle were up, we had some coffee and strawberries, just enough to tide us over until we got to the deliciousness of the farmers market.  What should have taken us about 15 minutes to walk there, turned into nearly 30 because Eddie kept changing his mode of transportation.  He oscillated between the stroller, Uncle's shoulders or arms, running, walking, and having Mama carry him.  It was ridiculous!

Shoulders...

Arms...

Walking...gotta fix his Spider Man sunglasses first!

Coming from Davis, home of a world famous farmers market, I was surprised and the size, variety, and business of this south bay market.  It was pretty big and had musicians at both ends of it.  Eddie loved it because it was right along the CalTrain tracks so he got to see a few choochoos go by.  Plus, he got a balloon (he chose the Spider Man option but pretended it was a leaf blower by scooting it along the ground making a "wrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr" noise...he's lucky he didn't pop it!). 

Waiting impatiently for his balloon.

At about 2pm we decided to head back to the apartment because Eddie was tired and we needed to pack up and head out.  We were going to having Cousin Zennie over to play that evening so her parents could go on a date.  (Unfortunately, Mike's back was hurting so they didn't end up coming over.  Hopefully we get to play with her soon, though!)  Eddie slept the whole drive home and was a happy camper when we got home to the doggies (and all his toys).  Our babysitter took good care of the dogs, chickens, and fish for us while we were gone. 

After some intense mess-making (I mean, train and block playing...) Eddie had mac-n-cheese for dinner and then went to bed.  Dave and I waited to eat until he was down so we could enjoy the pork pate I bought at the farmers market that morning.  Mmmmmmm, it was good.  

My next culinary goal is to make some pate; I just watched the Julia Child episode so it can't be that hard.

While we were munching on the crusty olive bread and buttery pate with pickles on top and spicy mustard below, my phone chirped to remind me that I had to bring 16 Valentine's cards to Eddie's preschool the next morning for their party.  DANG IT.  Downton Abbey was starting in only 30 minutes so I didn't have much time.  I pulled out my hefty craft bin and, in record time, Dave and I churned out 16 individualized cards for the kids.  Whew. 

I settled back on the couch to watch my favorite show of all time.  It was so annoying that the HD antenna wasn't working.  For the first half of the show the signal was bad so the image and sound would freeze.  At least it'll be streaming for free on PBS.org soon and the second half of the 2-hour show was fine.

Putah Creek and Oxford Circle Parks

Two weeks ago I had to use our friends' washing machine to run a load of diapers.  I'd thought our washer wasn't working (turns out it IS, thank goodness, but I needed to fiddle with the dial a bit to get it going).

So while the diapers washed, Eddie and I went to Putah Creek Park near their house in South Davis.  It was a cool park, but the play structures could definitely use a major pressure-washing to get all the gunk off. 

Last week we went to Oxford Park, nicely situated near Trader Joe's where we stopped for some snacks and orange flavored chewable vitamin C (Dave's favorite).  This park's play area was quite small; it seems that the main function of the whole park area is for frisbee golf.  It is bordered by a giant frat house, off-campus undergraduate dorms, and lots of apartments.  As such, it was littered with empty beer cases and teenaged guys playing frisbee or talking on cell phones.  Eddie was absolutely enamored by the frisbee golf and would shout, "WATCH OUT!" every time a frisbee came within about 100 feet of us (which, by the way, was quite often since one of the frisbee catchers (or is it a goal???) was near the play structure). 

We'll definitely be visiting this park again.  The play structure was a rope course type thing (plus some really tall swings that I loved and a mini carrousel).  It took a few minutes for Eddie to get the hang of climbing on wobbly ropes instead of the standard rigid materials (wood, plastic, metal) but he was delighted when he figured it out.

This week it was raining so we went to the library instead of a park.  Eddie isn't really into reading (except at night), which stinks.  So while he was playing with the toys at the library, I offered to read a book to an adorable little 3 year old, whose own mom was busy trying to get a video of her little boy, who was taking his very first steps right there!  So we sat on a small bench and started reading a neat book about Monarch butterflies and how they overwinter in Mexican forests.  (Particularly interesting to me, since we spend a whole day talking about this in the forest class I teach.)  A few pages into the book, Eddie spies me "cheating" on him.  He ripped the book out of my hands and tried to push the little girl off the bench, away from me.  I offered to read to both of them, but he didn't like the book we were reading.  So he ran off to find a new book.  And of allllllllllllllll the books in the library, what does he choose?  A dinosaur book that we have at home.  Sigh.  What a little weirdo.

Super Bowl Snacks

Pork dumplings, from AllRecipes.com

Ingredients

• 100 (3.5 inch square) wonton wrappers
• 1 3/4 pounds ground pork
• 1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger root
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons thinly sliced green onion
• 4 tablespoons soy sauce
• 3 tablespoons sesame oil
• 1 egg, beaten
• 5 cups finely shredded Chinese cabbage

Sauce Ingredients

• 2 T rice vinegar
• 1 T sesame oil
• 1 T soy sauce
• 1 T fish sauce
• 1 scallion, sliced very thinly

Directions

1. In a large bowl, combine the pork, ginger, garlic, green onion, soy sauce, sesame oil, egg and cabbage. Stir until well mixed.
2. Place 1 heaping teaspoon of pork filling onto each wonton skin. Moisten edges with water and fold edges over to form a triangle shape. Roll edges slightly to seal in filling. Set dumplings aside on a lightly floured surface until ready to cook.
3. To Cook: Steam dumplings in a covered bamboo or metal steamer for about 15 to 20 minutes. Serve immediately. 

To freeze: place on cookie sheet and freeze until solid. Then place in plastic bags. To cook from frozen, boil for 10 minutes. 

The only ground pork I could find at Safeway was $5.49/pound.  Yeah right.  There was bone-in shoulder for only $2.39/pound so I bought that instead and just ground it up myself.  So now I have another 2.5 pounds of fatty ground pork in my fridge, just waiting for some sausage seasonings.  I think it'll turn into breakfast sausage patties for the freezer.  Mmmm.

Filling these is a time consuming process.  Next time we'll make a double batch and fill them in front of the tv while watching a movie. Or invite a bunch of people over and do it around a table so we can chat at the same time.

It didn't occur to me until later that I could have just used my metal veggie steamer...oh well. I like this one.

We used two sauces, the one listed above and also some of the spicy-sweet brine from my candied jalapenos. It was even better (read: freaking amazing) when we eventually just mixed the sauces together. This is our last bottle of jalapenos...Dave was pretty distressed about it...he's now counting down the days to summer when our garden will be bursting with peppers so we can make more.

Steamed and ready to eat.

 Chicken Satay with Peanut Sauce

Ingredients

• 1 pound skinless, boneless chicken thighs, cut into 1/2 inch strips
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger root
• 1 tablespoon fish sauce
• 2 teaspoons peanut oil
• 4 shallots, minced
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger root
• 2 small red chile peppers, seeded and minced
• 1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
• 1 3/4 cups coconut milk
• 2 teaspoons soy sauce
• 2 teaspoons brown sugar
• 1 1/2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 1/2 tablespoons lime juice
• 12 wooden skewers, soaked in water for 1 hour

Directions

1. Toss chicken, garlic, ginger, and 1 tablespoon fish sauce in a bowl until the chicken is coated in the marinade. Cover, and marinate for 1 hour.
2. While the chicken is marinating, heat the peanut oil in a skillet over medium heat. Stir in shallots, garlic, ginger, and chile peppers. Cook and stir until the shallot begins to turn golden brown, about 7 minutes. Reduce heat to low, and stir in peanut butter, coconut milk, soy sauce, brown sugar, 1 1/2 tablespoons fish sauce, and lime juice until blended. Simmer very gently for 10 minutes, then remove from heat and keep warm.
3. Preheat an outdoor grill for medium-high heat and lightly oil grate. Thread chicken onto skewers.
4. Grill chicken skewers on preheated grill until no longer pink in the center, about 3 minutes per side. Serve with warm peanut sauce.

Keke pua’a dough recipe from Panipopos.blogspot.com (my own pictures, though)


I used only a half recipe and did half whole wheat and filled them with beef stew.


Ingredients

• 2 Tablespoons dry yeast
• ¼ cup (60ml) warm water
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• ½ cup (120ml) warm milk
• ¼ cup melted butter
• ¼ cup (50g) sugar
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 3½ cups (437.5g) all purpose flour

Mix the yeast, water and first measure of sugar in a large bowl. Let it stand for 5 minutes until it’s frothy.

In the meantime, combine the milk, butter, second lot of sugar, salt and eggs. Add this to the yeast mixture and mix until combined.

Add 3 cups of the flour and gradually mix it together until it forms a dough. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead it until it’s smooth, about 10 minutes, working in the remaining ½ cup of flour.

Grease the bowl, place the dough back in there, cover and let rise until it’s doubled in size.

While the dough is rising, cut out 16 4” (10cm) square pieces of waxed paper. Set up your steamer. Get your keke filling to room temperature. Anything else? Yeah, while you’re at it, do the dishes.

When your dough has doubled, punch it down then divide into 16 even pieces. Roll each piece into a ball, then roll or press into a 4 inch (10cm) circle, dusting with flour if necessary.

Spoon a generous amount of filling into the centre of each circle, being careful not to get liquid on the edges. (Wet edges are hard to seal.)

Pleat the edges together over the filling and close the top by pinching and twisting the dough together.

Place each bun on a piece of waxed paper, pleated side up if you’re proud of your pleats, or pleated side down if you screwed it up prefer a smooth top surface. Put your buns at least 2 inches (5 cm) apart from each other to rise. Let them rise until doubled in size (about 45 minutes) and then steam them on full steam for 15 minutes.

Filled and ready to rise.

Risen and ready to steam.

Nice and cozy in the steamer.

Cute, aren't they?

 I had planned on making some rainbow fruit skewers with a yogurt dipping sauce...but...I ate all the yogurt the night before and then Eddie ate most of the fruit while I was cooking.  He now asks for "green fruit" (kiwi) for breakfast.  Heehee.

So we didn't really watch the game, only half time, but did enjoy having a dinner full of tasty snacks.

Super Duper Weekend

Dave had a late meeting on Thursday night so I suggested that he spend the night in Gualala and just drive home the next day.  Sometimes he likes to just power through and drive late, late at night, but it makes me nervous.  So I called his mom early Thursday afternoon and asked her if she could "encourage" Dave to just spend the night.  It worked!

He was planning on getting home around 10am on Friday, perfect timing for me to get to lab by 10:30 to start the second run on my instrument (my intern starts one at 8am everyday so it isn't ready for the next sample until 10-10:30am).  But I got a text from him at about 10 saying he'd just left!  Ack.  I had a LOT of time sensitive work to do that day, so I just took Eddie to school with me.  He was a pretty good boy--eating snacks and watching some Netflix shows on my laptop while I got my compost jars sealed and incubating for two hours.  When we were done with the sample prep, we walked back down the hallway to my office.  He knows that Lucas (ex-roommate) works here, too, so he kept yelling, "Where Wucas??"  It was super cute.

Finally, at about noon, Dave showed up at my building to collect Eddie.  They scooted off to Home Depot to buy a replacement dishwasher and get a few things at Costco.

Initially, we'd scheduled Saturday for playing in the snow (the dogs and Eddie have never been to the snow).  We want to take Eddie to one of those snow parks with a magic carpet lift up to the top of a sledding hill...but those are all about 2 hours away.  And since Eddie slept in until 9am (!!), we decided not to go.  Instead, we went to the lower site of Cache Creek regional park.  I wanted to go on a hike and then have a picnic, but since the creek was so close to the parking area, the canine and toddler members of our family go distracted playing in the water.  We we found a sandy beach area where we threw things for the dogs and ate our picnic lunch. 

Cute fellas checking out the picnic spots.

I brought the hiking pack for Eddie...but he wasn't interested so I hauled our lunch cooler in it instead.

Doggies are ready for someone to throw a stick into the water!

Eddie found a stick...

...But then realized a rock might be more manageable.

He got so dirty playing in the water and sand that we wouldn't let him touch the food. So we fed him with our clean hands.

Attempt #1 at getting a group shot.

Attempt #93746401202 at getting a group shot. Eventually we gave up.

Once the beach fell into the shade and we got cold, we moved back up the bank to a sunny picnic table to finish eating.

Wadamus was tired from all the playing so he gladly climbed into the pack for the short walk back to the car. He is soooooooo heavy.

On Sunday morning, while I prepped our Super Bowl Sunday snack feast, Dave dug a two foot deep hole under the bathroom window, searching for the sewer line.  We want to install an outdoor clean-out just in case we ever need it.  Eddie inspected the hole for a while and approved Dave's work.

The city records of our house plans don't indicate the location of the sewer line OR the sewer manhole.  Isn't that weird?  I think I found the manhole, though, in the park next to our fence.  He never did find it, so he'll dig a trench along the back of the fence some other time to look for it.  

Later, Dave removed the old dishwasher since I'll have the Home Depot delivery guy take it away when he delivers our new one tomorrow.  First I harvested all the goodies from it that might be useful some day.  We took off: the electrical cord, the springs, the rollers (those might be fun when Eddie starts building things in the garage in a few years), and the racks.  With all the cooking I do, I often end up with an overflowing drying rack (even with a working dishwasher).  So I swapped out the small countertop rack with a dishwasher rack.  I love that we have lots of counter space in this kitchen so it doesn't make much difference to have a giant drying rack.  

Instead of a dish towel underneath, this one requires a (folded up) bath towel.

I'll put the Super Bowl snacks and recipes into another post.  We didn't really watch the game...only the halftime show.  Which, by the way, I thought was pretty awesome.  But I think halftime performers should avoid wearing giant heeled boots next year.  Last year I could hardly watch Fergie dance because it was embarrassingly awkward looking and this year Madonna almost fell (but of course, that could be age, too).

Our Staycation

For the last year, Dave and I had been planning to go to Costa Rica or Hawaii for a week alone.  This vacation would be to celebrate passing my QE and to have some quality "us" time, which has been sorely lacking in recent years considering his work, my school, and Eddie.We set aside a little money and eventually bought a Groupon for a week in Costa Rica at a resort, complete with cooking lessons and a 4 course dinner from a private chef.

But after reviewing my research project and teaching calendars (along with the available dates for the small resort), I realized we couldn't go.  Lucky for me, I was able to cancel for a full refund, within Groupon's 30 day policy.

So we settled on Kauai and began looking on occasion at package deals.  Theeeeeeeeeeen I had a meeting with my fellowship administrator at the beginning of January...and it basically ruined my plans for a nice vacation.  Her exact words were that she would be taking my instrument back, "no questions asked, end of discussion, by May 1."  This isn't unreasonable, of course, but still sucks.  I mean, having a deadline and some pressure from above is always a good thing for a graduate student.  But it means that I will be busting my butt in the lab until then and probably can't squeeze in any long weekends up to Gualala, much less a week in Hawaii.

I could have cried over this, but instead decided to change our plans again--instead of having a week long vacation, we'd just take smaller local vacations instead.  Cassie still owes us a few free overnights for Eddie so booking a hotel for a weekend once a month is doable.  First up was a weekend in the wine country over a long weekend.  Lucky for me, it was a three day weekend so we could spend two nights away.

We started out with sneaking Taco Bell burritos into the theater to see MI4.  Then we drove to Napa to stay in a Pricelined 3 star hotel. It was nice, but sort of loud too early in the morning since our room was near the lobby. 

Our hotel room.

Happy hotellers

We ate a very small breakfast of coffee and OJ at the hotel that morning so we could save our calories for an amazing lunch at Bouchon.  It did not disappoint!

 

We started with mussels and pate.

I had the rabbit cassoulet.

 Dave had gnocchi...no surprise.

 After that we headed to Vacaville for some outlet shopping.  Dave was in serious, serious need of new sneakers and my mom had given him a New Balance Outlet card for Christmas. On our way there we witnessed a scary SUV-motorcycle accident.  A giant piece of plastic bumper flew up across the freeway and landed on the windshield of a Landrover. It was in the left lane just ahead of us (we were in the middle) and it drove up onto the cement barrier and then swerved across all the lanes and spun to a stop on the right of the freeway. In the right lane was a motorcyclist and she was run over and then spun over an embankment, across the exit lane, and landed on the right shoulder.  HOLY CRAP IT WAS SCARY. We pulled over, called 911 (I was so flustered I told the operator it happened at the wrong exit), and walked back to the cyclist. There were other people by the time we arrived and there were a few women literally holding this lady down on her back because she kept trying to get up. She was bleeding from the back of her head and you could see that her ear was torn at the top. Dave and I talked to the family in the SUV who had hit her. The guy was so freaked out and shaking and remorseful--poor guy was so scared for the cyclist. I hope the lady is okay. I keep thinking about her and hoping that she's out of the hospital with just some stitches or something.

Eventually we left the accident scene and bought Dave some new shoes, me a few kitchen things (like a donut pan!), and got a coffee. Then we headed to Winters and checked into our room at the Abbey House Inn.  We got to stay in the Sherlock Holmes room.

Since we've both eaten at the Buckhorn Steakhouse several times (including as take-out the night Eddie was born...my mom brought us some trip tip to the hospital!), we decided to try something new.  Cassie RAVES about Ficelles, this little tapas restaurant. Oh man, I am so glad we decided to eat there.  It was insane inside, crammed full of people, and a little confusing as to how/where to order.  But for good reason: the food is amazing.  We ordered something like 5 plates and they were all super delish. I only have pictures of these ones...but I think there were more.

Veggie plate (croutons, bean salad, green beans, roasted baby bells).

Chile relleno with cherry tomatoes and mole sauce.

Teriyaki beef skewers.

Downtown Winters, very small and quaint (at least on the main drag).

We walked back to the Inn, where we watched a documentary about wolverines while digesting our dinner.  Dave took a short nap and I surfed the web for a bunk bed for Eddie.  We were going to go see a used one posted on Craigslist but it was sold before we got there.  Dave was having seconds thoughts on having Eddie (who is only 2.5 years old) use a ladder bunk bed.  So when I found some styles with stairs, Dave decided that we should buy one of those.  When Dave woke up from his nap we finalized the online purchase of the bunk bed before walking back downtown for some dessert at Buckhorn. 

Mud pie and lemon berry cake (Dave is getting tired of my picture-taking I think).

The night at the Inn was okay--our room was a little too warm even with the window open and I could hear the guy in the next room snoring from our bathroom.

We had an early breakfast at Putah Creek Cafe, where I had this delicious pomegranate mimosa with my French toast.  Mmmm.

Before heading out of town we stopped by a pharmacy store and bought a dinosaur for Eddie.  I also bought him a cute tea set, but he'll have to wait until his Easter basket to get that.  Dave picked out a clearanced John Deere mug and tea pot set for his dad, too.

Then we picked Eddie up at Cassie's and got to spend the rest of the day together doing normal Bower weekend stuff: laundry, playing outside, gathering eggs, playing trains inside, etc.  It was an absolutely perfect weekend.