I may be a city girl with light skin, wavy hair and blue eyes, but I married a country, man’s man with olive skin, brown hair and hazel eyes. And together we had a olive skinned, blonde hair and blue eyed baby who, turns out, is a country girl through and through. Nature works in wonders and our own traits spotted in our children are (at least to me) fascinating. Believe me… I’d have never wanted to do that as a kid.
Even though I relished my summers with my grandparents and their garden, I am a city girl at heart. I was definitely reminded of this when I decided to go strawberry picking. That said, I firmly believe that harvesting your own food that makes it that more special. Alas, faced with some free time and good weather, I left Sophia with her Grammie…
and ran out to the local farm. Who wouldn’t want to start out their weekend with these views? …
and head home with these…
only to turn some of them into this:
And that is Strawberry Sour Cream Ice Cream from my newly purchased ice cream cookbook.
… eats together. It just so happened that both hubby and I bought new cookbooks this past week. We hadn’t planned it and didn’t even talk about it with one another. Good timing though because my in-laws were coming in from out of town. We like to feed them with good food to ensure they’ll be back. Cooking, you see, is something that we both really enjoy especially when we can do so together. Two extra pairs of hands were of immense help with Sophia and allowed us to try something from each of our cookbooks. The results were quite delicious — and not very difficult either.
I tried my hand at dumplings from this book.
and can report that they were very successful.
Then… while I relaxed for a few minutes, hubby made cumin beef from the same book. That, with plain white rice was a huge success even with the youngest diners. 🙂
My mother-in-law baked a delicious vanilla cake with vanilla buttercream for us for the occasion of our 5th wedding anniversary. She’s a pro at decorating and we’re pros at … well … cake consumption :-).
… this has become a tradition and follows the cake she baked when we secretly eloped Quaker style.
It was quite a bit of cake and so we froze the top heart-shaped layer with the big “5” on it. We’ve been sternly warned that she better not see THAT cake at Sophia’s 5th birthday celebration :-).
Behold, a flashback!
Five years since this day… 5 degrees, 3 continents, 2 moves, 1 child and countless moments filled with infinite joy!
Imitation is one of life’s biggest compliments, right? Here’s Sophia trying to imitate smiling — naturally. Fear not, we’re not trying to coach her for child modeling. Although…. no, no, we’re not.
Here she is smiling on command…
Here is a slightly more refined smile… after some coaching …
… and …
Nothing beats the real thing!
You’ll have to excuse the phone photography and overlook the bruise on the lip and nose… sigh.
The things we do for ourselves that we NEED really want to do and have a difficult time giving up unless faced with serious deadlines/commitments. We all have them. Among my Monday morning guilty pleasures is reading the New York Times’ wedding section. It reads much like a mergers and acquisitions list in the business section. Young, good looking, educated and from well-to-do families reciting their vows in creative ways at expansive enclaves in the presence of their closest friends and loved ones. Some of the nuptials are mergers where the bride and bridegroom are a power-couple whose power will exponentially increase once joined in holy matrimony. Other times, the wedding is a fancily wrapped acquisition like most have been since the dawn of times: a well-to-do groom acquiring a bride from a well-to-do family.
The devil is of course in the details of how the announcement is composed. Reading them is nothing short of decoding a secret message … words like “until recently, the bride” or “also a [insert worthwhile profession], the groom is …”. The most telling bits of the announcement are of course the ones that are not written.
I first got into wedding announcement reading while trying to plan our wedding and it has just become a guilty pleasure since then. As our fifth year anniversary is coming up in a few days, all these wedding announcements got me thinking; aren’t all marriages business transactions? Sure, I’d like to think that people ultimately get married because they love one another, but finding a partner is not just about love. It is about finding a person who compliments you, your lifestyle and your family. Like in all partnerships in life, your life partner has to bring something to the table. What they choose/can bring to the table that speaks volumes. Some bring successful careers and adventure travel, others good looks and then there are some who bring more tangible offerings …
Looking at little Sophia suited up in her yellow and pink monkey pajamas, I can’t help but think what a potential suitor will bring to the table in a proposal, but more importantly, what will she?
Just the three of us and just three days off. Memorial Day weekend came and went and I am here to report that we had a great time. First and foremost … as this dictates the fun-levels when hanging out around the house is weather. The rain held off as did the heat and the humidity. We spent hours outside at the playground, visiting the zoo, our local pool (we didn’t go in, but went to re-acquaint ourselves) and gardening. I finally planted those tomato and pepper plants and tried my best to fortify the garden to prevent little rabbits and chipmunks from snacking on our goodies. Sophia’s taken a keen interest in gardening and especially loves to smell all the herbs. She happily rips off a little mint leaf smells it and then urges hubby and me to follow suit. I hope this will help educate her that our veggies don’t grow shrink-wrapped in the supermarket.
We also tried some new recipes like this chicken curry from none other than Bon Appetit.
and these beignets
… getting a shower of cinnamon sugar
… and tada!
… they’re light and fluffy and even our youngest gourmand helped herself to one.
But as healthy good as those beignets were, there is nothing like a fresh radish and scallion salad with a touch of sour cream (you can also use yogurt to dress).
I grew up eating salads like this one, and it is just a refreshing and welcoming spring greeting much like the weekend itself.
Checking in on day 2 of a much-needed 3-day weekend. We decided to stay local and check out some of the things that are going on around the D.C. area. That’s one of the things that this city has going for it: things to do and places to be. Since the weather is chilly but pretty much gorgeous, we decided to head to the zoo. Our local rabbits, deer, chipmunks and the likes have all become too regular for Sophia and we figured a few lions, and tigers would spice things up. We weren’t the only ones with this brilliant idea as you can imagine. It was packed. Since it was our first time at the National Zoo, we took it easy and got the lay of the land. The elephant exhibit got seriously high marks today. Here’s hubby providing prime viewing opportunity for Sophia.
… I on the other hand was in charge of all things water… like the turtles who were sunbathing.
… She also liked the lions and once we did all that, it was time to get home for some needed respit and sustenance.
Well… like I told you before, spring came and went. Poof… all gone now. The summer is decidedly here whether we like it or not. It is hot. More importantly, and somewhat disappointedly — it is humid. Poor little Sophia comes home from her walks all balmy and flushed.
While being outside is loosing its appeal due to the sheer stick-factor, gardening is quickly becoming one of my very favorite things to do. I really do enjoy puttering in the dirt especially since everything is coming in. Well, almost everything. Our shiso seems to have decided not to come up at all. Sigh. Our radishes, arugula, peas, basil and mesclun greens are coming in nicely. I am ashamed to admit that I have yet to plant tomatoes and at this rate, we’ll likely be enjoying them (if the deer don’t get to them) in November :-). Here’s what is going on in our neck of the woods.
