"We're messy... but we're happy and we eat good!"

That was a quote from today and boy is it true! No progress on the clutter, the boxes, or the dishes, but we had a lovely night just the same. B. had a playoff game for his ultimate frisbee league (which he won), and it was at one of the more stunning state parks, so I got to sit under the trees with my friend from work and watch the game surrounded by hills and a sunset lake.

After that, we invited our friend back to our house for homemade whole wheat calzones. When I was making them they seemed so modest that I was worried everyone would leave hungry... but then I looked in the oven:

Nothin' like 5 inch high calzones!! Guess what all three of us are having for lunch tomorrow?? B. wants me to be sure to take pictures of Thursday's game so I can let everyone know if he won or not so stay tuned :)

The Great Clean-Out

B. and baby S. play with the magnets

The pasta was so good it was necessary to eat it with two hands!

B. and I had a lovely and productive weekend. We got to see one of our favorite babies and her mom (Jaynes Ave), share of bottle of the very yummy wine we brought back from my dad's house, and continued the great clean-out of 2007. What is the "great clean-out" you ask? Well, when B. and I moved into our house last August, life was sprinting at a full and frenetic pace. We were homeless for three weeks, only had one car, both had new jobs, were gone every single weekend for various weddings and other events, etc. It was all we could do to unpack, to say nothing for weeding out.

So we have begun the weeding out process. It's going very slowly as we've had very few weekends at home, but it's coming along. This weekend B. tackled the boxes of random items that have been hidden behind a screen in the "man room" for a year now. To illustrate just how random the boxes were, some of the items he ran across were: His Eagle Scout badge, old cub scout uniform (which he tried on), his original birth certificate, a picture of the lead singer of Tar Beach with Carmen Electra, old sheets, soap, golf balls, etc. By the time we're through, the Salvation Army will need a dump truck to load everything up!

On a different note, we managed to be kick ass menu planners this week. About once every six weeks we are actually home on a weekend with enough time to pour through recipes, plan out our dinners, and go grocery shopping for all the necessary ingredients. I poured through all of my old Cooking Lite magazines (which I LOVE) and pulled out tons of recipes. We picked about two weeks worth of dinners and loaded up our cabinets. Of course, it was about 9pm by the time we got home, so instead of the roast chicken we were planning, we went for a much easier dinner: Grilled cheese made on french bread with shredded sharp cheddar, tomatoes, and fresh basil, with a side of organic tomato soup. I wish I could say I made the soup, but I haven't ventured there yet.

On a separate note, please say some prayers and well wishes for our dear friends who are going through a rough time right now. We love them so much and want nothing but the best for them. The nature of blogs is that they are edited for optimism - people don't often want to read about the harsher truths of life, but sometimes that's just what life is.

Sicko

I'm back on the east coast but without a computer (typing this after hours at work) since B. is down in DC on a business trip. A normal red eye flight is bad enough, but a red eye where you don't even get to sit with your fiancee, have to sit in a middle seat, and then have to drive to DC with your boss an hour after getting home is pretty much as bad as it gets. Luckily he returns on Friday night and doesn't have to give up his weekend. He has put a ban on seeing anyone or having any social functions that don't directly relate to golf. I told him that there was a lot of cleaning to do, so I was fine with that plan.

When we were out in Washington we all went to see Michael Moore's latest film Sicko. It was funny, horribly sad, shocking, touching, and interesting. Definitely my favorite of his films so far. In the past he has tended to be a little too inflammatory for my taste, despite the fact that he was shining light on issues that needed to be talked about. But in this movie he really does just let the facts and the interviews speak for themselves without unnecessary editorializing. I don't want to divulge too much of the movie here, but if you have the chance please, please go see it.

Two things from the movie that really affected me and made me think long afterwards:

1) People who work for our health insurance companies are given rewards - actually financial bonuses - when they can turn down enough claims to make the company a profit. This is opposed to doctors who work in England (and are paid for by the government) who are given bonuses when they can increase the number of their patients who are healthy - by encouraging preventative medicine, adequate health care, etc. The doctors are encouraged to do what they wanted to do all along, which is make people well. It was such a simple and shocking difference. Can you imagine a health care system where you go to the doctor immediately because you are never concerned about finances, and have faith that you will get all of the tests and treatments you need without having to fight for them?

2) In the part of the movie where he is comparing our health care system to that of other countries, he sits down with a group of Americans living in France to discuss the basic differences between lifestyles. Not just health insurance, but overall wellness. None of the information was new to me, but again, to be reminded of it was so intense when you're sitting in the theater comparing everything they speak about to life in America... the French eat less healthy, exercise less, and yet still live longer than we do, the average amount of vacation time is 7 weeks with an extra week the year you get married for your honeymoon, the doctors make house calls, all mothers are provided with a baby nurse for their newborns, etc, etc, etc.

Setting aside the entire issue of health care, it was such a piercing reminder of how hard we are on ourselves here... how much we work, how little vacation we take, how rarely we just celebrate the joy of life and family and wine and dancing. I feel like most of the time even when we are vacationing or celebrating, we're not doing it with full force. It's not full bodied celebration, just going through the motions. It was a lovely reminder to not take it all so seriously, celebrate with all that you've got, and just relish the beauty that surrounds us.

A Day of Water

Just a quick note for today to show you what we did. First we drove to Multnomah Falls, one of the highest waterfalls in the US, and then we went on a jet boat ride of the Columbia River. The falls were truly stunning and I wish we had more time to wander around and take it all in, but we were on a schedule. I also was wishing that I had my larger camera because we could have taken some spectacular pictures. The jet boat ride was fun, although our driver was a little irresponsible and instead of the fun donuts he's supposed to do in the boat, he did them at about 45mph and one of the ladies got hurt pretty badly trying to hold onto her daughter and herself. It's not worth getting into the whole story now, so you can just enjoy the photos.

This is the falls. It's basically a double waterfall - you can see both in this picture.

Trying to survive the wind and water on the jet boat ride.

This is an oil tanker that is larger than the Titanic. However, ever since the Exxon Valdez disaster, single hulled tankers (only one layer of steel between oil and ocean) are not allowed in the US so this just sits here.

Wine Making

We did it!!! We bottled all of our wine and it was awesome! It was so cool to learn about the process of bottling. The wine is a Merlot that has been fermenting since 2005 when the grapes were originally crushed, and it's probably the best wine that my dad and his wife have made so far. Practice has definitely made perfect.

First we transferred it from the oak barrels into the glass carboys, then we pumped it from the carboys into the bottles, and then we corked it. Now it sits in the bottles for about 9 months before we add the silver foils to the top - that way the cork can breathe in the meantime. We have 168 mini-bottles so that will have to be the upper limit for wedding guests :)

Testing the wine inside the oak barrels.
It's drawn out with a glass pipette and put into a glass beaker.

Drinking from the beaker.

Using the wine pump to pump the wine from the oak barrels into the glass carboys.

Transferring from the carboys into the small wine bottles.

Using the corker to cork the bottles. We had to have the strongest person in the room do it b/c it's quite difficult!

All done! 168 mini bottles of wine are all set for the wedding favors. These are some of the larger bottles my brother and I get to take home as a bonus.

Laughing and laughing...

One of the things I love most about my family is that everyone has a great sense of humor and thoroughly appreciates a good story or a teasing comment. In fact, my brother consistently holds the title of "funniest man on the planet" (for me) for his dry, smart ass remarks.

Last night was the most perfect night for that. My dad and his wife D. prepared great food and wine and had their friends over for a wonderful celebration. After we showed the ring and retold the engagement story, I sat at a table with B, my brother, and my dad and did nothing but laugh for hours. Then we listened to a Dane Cook comedy CD for a few minutes and nearly cried with laughter, and then kept going with more stories. Lots of stories about all the crazy things that happen with cars, that seemed to be the theme for the night. Seeing people get hit by cars, pushing cars in your slippers for 5 blocks to save the $50 towing fee, getting hit by blind old ladies, etc. On and on... It was a truly joyous night, we couldn't have asked for anything better.

View from the back porch

Practicing for next year

This is what your dishwasher looks like when you're the co-presidents of your wine club!

Relaxing Start

It's 6:30am and since I'm still on east coast time, I'm wide awake. B. doesn't wake up at 6:30am regardless of what time zone he's in... based purely on principle, I'm sure. Yesterday was a very low key day, which was nice. A good way to start your vacation. Today we're headed up to my dad's house in Washington to help them get ready for our evening engagement party. We don't know too many of their friends, but we do know a few and everyone we meet is always very nice anyway, so it doesn't matter too much. Also, it's my dad and his wife's 2nd anniversary, so it's a double celebration. To keep you entertained, here are some pictures from yesterday.

Mark's fish tank, filled with 6 African Cichlids.
B. loves fish and took lots of pictures. In fact, I had to force him to stop.

The boys made us a great dinner on the grill - steaks, asparagus, and corn on the cob

Since we were all too tired to go to a movie, we stayed in.
The boys played poker....

And the one token girl - me! - watched Sex & the City.

We Made It!

We've arrived safely on the left coast. Of course, not without the requisite flight drama, but we're here nonetheless. Our flight out of Syracuse was delayed by two hours due to thunderstorms, so we hung around the airport-of-nothingness for quite a while. They told us we would almost certainly miss our connection in Chicago, necessitating an overnight stay, but the pilot told us he was going to go as fast as the plane could go. We still arrived in Chicago too late, but luckily the next flight was delayed just enough to catch it. Of course, this was only after running what was almost nearly a mile through O'Hare. Do you know how many silent chuckles you get from airport strangers when two people are attempting to run and one has a severe back injury and one is carrying two heavy laptop cases? And do you know how huge O'Hare is?!

But like I said, we did finally make it. Today we're trying to shake off the jet lag and enjoy a low-key, rainy day with my brother. Tonight is grilling, alcohol, and a movie. Here is a picture of a friend we made while waiting in Syracuse:

Italy meets Japan

Life is usually pretty boring during the week, so I'll entertain you with tonight's dinner. I'm always so impressed when we can come up with something that is both genuinely fast and genuinely healthy, so I have to share! Tonight's offering was whole wheat pizza topped with roasted tomatoes and feta cheese, and a side of edamame thrown in just for something green and yummy. Wegmans sells great whole wheat pizza dough and I've found through experimenting that we only need 1/3 of it to make a pizza or calzone for two. (Of course, neither of us are big eaters, so other people may need 1/2) So I use 1/3 of the dough and divide and freeze the rest for easy dinners later. One note on the roasted tomatoes, also ascertained through experimenting: be sure to drain as much of the oil out as you can otherwise your pizza will be way too soggy.

On a non food-related note, B. and I will be leaving Thursday night for the great west coast. Having three families (two on my side, one on his) makes it too difficult to see everyone during the holidays and still actually enjoy the holidays, so we're doing things differently this year. We're seeing my dad and his wife during the summer and seeing my mom and B's family during December. It's actually nicer that way because summer weather is much kinder for sight seeing and general activity than winter weather is.

In addition to our Portland activities with my brother, the Washington activities will include a small engagement BBQ celebration, and bottling 160 small bottles of wine for wedding favors! For those who don't know, my dad and his wife are co-presidents of their wine club and generously offered to make us a special batch of "wedding wine" to give away as favors. It's been fermenting and doing it's special wine thing for a year now, so it's time to bottle and cork! I'll be sure you let you know how it goes...

Ms. Crate & Barrel

Many thanks to Grandma and Grandpa M. for our very first registry present!! As soon as we have a weekend when we're actually here, making waffles will be our first priority! I'll have to invest in some strawberries and whipped cream so we can have the full package. Thanks again!

Marriage: Counting Down & Counting Up

B. and I had a marriage-themed weekend. We continued our countdown year by going wedding dress shopping (well... one of us went wedding dress shopping) and also got to celebrate his parent's 35th anniversary with a lovely surprise dinner.

Wedding dress shopping was fairly brief as we only had one appointment, but still very fun. After all, how could it not be fun to have someone bring you $1000 dresses to try on as you're standing on a pedestal. Please! Despite the fact that one of the dresses had such a large skirt that I immediately burst out laughing because I looked like something that should be on top of a music box, we did find one possibility. B. has forbidden me from writing about it here since he would read it, but it was gorgeous.

I have two more appointments coming up... one at the beginning of August and one in the middle of August. The appt. at the beginning of August is the mom's trip. Because we were in town as a surprise we couldn't have B's mom come along for the trip and I really want her to be able to come on at least one appt., so we're going to try to arrange a meeting in Binghamton. And the third trip will be the big one where my two main ladies, Feather Nester, and M., will be in town for. As you may know, pictures are strictly forbidden, so I don't have any fun shots for you. (Incidentally, did you know that they even take the labels out of all the dresses so you can't find a dress you like and then get it off the Internet for cheaper! You'd think you were shopping for nuclear weapons given the level of security at those places!)

After dress shopping and the requisite afternoon nap, we prettied ourselves up and headed out to dinner. We went to an amazing steak house! Best example of the fanciness level: We walk to the table, I set my purse on the floor and put my napkin in my lap. Immediately, fancy waiter lady repels from the ceiling and says "here is a little table for your purse and a napkin to match your dress" and gave me a tiny leather table for my purse and swooped my horribly gauche white napkin from my lap and replaced it with a more appropriate black one. What?!??! Crazy! But great! We were treated so well that I was sort of surprised when the ladies room didn't come with a personal potty assistant.

Anyway, it was such a lovely night and so great to see B's family and celebrate their 35 years together. Here are some pictures for you...

The happy couple - 35 years.

Happy couple #2 - Almost 1 year

Happy couple #3 - 11 months until it's official

Real people drink Dewars.

Rough Night

Sigh... not the most perfect Thursday one could ask for. Tonight I picked up B. from work - we were both starving and he had an incredibly rough day. Not in the mood to cook or even think about food, we ordered take out Chinese. But B. decided that this wasn't quite enough of a solution to ease the troubles of the day and got a bottle of Pinot Noir.

We get home, I'm putting the food on plates (we may as well pretend it's a real dinner!), and I hear "oh no!" I run into the living room (thankfully it's not on fire since that's what happened the last time he uttered those words!), but in his hungry impatience to get himself and his wine glasses to the coffee table, he spilled the wine, which splashed all over the cream couch. Sigh...

Thankfully the sales people were right and our microfiber couch really was easy to clean - even red wine! I thought for sure it would never work, but a damp soapy paper towel got all the stains out.

Just as I thought we were recovering from that part of the night, we were playing around and I took a pretty vicious knee to the back of my head. So now I'm nauseous and have a terrible headache. Sigh...

To improve both my mood and yours, I give you a video of Miles playing with the paper towels that were left in the living room...

Wedding Wednesday

B. and I picked our photographer!! Yeah! We absolutely love her. Not only is she incredibly talented, but her customer service has been unbelievable so far, which is not something I can say for all the other photographers I either emailed or met with. Also, she's very confident and will be great at giving art direction. We sat down to meet with her and didn't have to struggle to come up with interview questions, she told us everything we would want to know and more. I hope I can have half as much confidence in the rest of our vendors as I have in her. I'm an over-thinker anyway, and since the photos are so important to me, with anyone else I would have felt distracted with concern that they were getting all the right shots. But I won't have that at all with her. I wasn't able to grab any of the photos from her website to show you, but click here to link to the site.

Also, I think we have the bridesmaid dresses figured out as well! I was so convinced that would take forever, and also convinced that I didn't even want to think about it until after I found my dress. However, great friend and bridal party member M. sent me a link to After Six and I fell in love with so many of their dresses, as well as their Bordeaux color. It looks like just what it sounds like, a deep wine color. With the whole wedding taking place outside I wanted a color that would really pop and all of the girls in the wedding have beautiful dark hair, so they'll look amazing in this color. Not everyone will be in the same dress, so you can see some of the possibilities here, and here, and here, and here, and here! Be sure to click on the color to change the dresses to Bordeaux so you know exactly what they'll look like. And there are even more possibilities than what I've listed here.

I'm so thankful that everything seems to be falling into place in the most wonderful way. No stress or drama and everyone involved has been so supportive and loving and creative. To all of my wedding girls and anyone else involved in other ways, thank you so much for your support, it's truly overwhelming to someone who's as stubbornly independent as I am :)

Wedding Progress

B. and I had a wonderful weekend in Rochester with our great friends (and bridal party members) D. & M. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures, but that's because I was enjoying our time together too much to stop for pictures! On Saturday the boys went golfing while I got to see my cousin and her two kids. It was so great to catch up, even if it was only for a few hours. After cousin-bonding time, the girls relaxed over a bottle of wine and waited for golf to end. We finished the night with a nice dinner and more wine out on the patio. D. & M. have such an amazing new house that I can't even do it justice by attempting to explain it. Let's just say that I didn't even know houses that beautiful existed!

Then today was wedding vendor day. We initially had three appointments but two of the three photographers booked up in the last few days, so we ended up with only one appt. We absolutely loved the woman we met with and are pretty sure we're going to book her. We're scrimping on every single other part of our wedding to try to keep costs in check, but photography is the one place where we really wanted someone great. I have another photographer that I'm meeting with tomorrow night, so we'll see.

The other wedding-related thing I did was borrow my veil! M. bought a stunning veil two years ago for her own wedding and generously offered to let me borrow it. I tried it on today just for fun. B. asked if I was going to randomly start wearing it around the house, but I told him I would refrain. It actually felt much more like part of a Halloween costume than part of wedding attire when I tried it on. Maybe I need the dress to make it feel official...

Food & Fun

The garden has sprouted!!! Yesterday B. and I noticed that we have our first signs of actual growth in our new garden. It's so exciting!! I've never really grown anything from scratch before, so the fact that we spotted a little pepper and that our tomato and onion plants are doing so well was big news!

Hi little pepper!

Walla Walla Onions

A very healthy looking tomato plant

Last night we continued our food celebration by having a friend over for dinner and making my famous homemade spinach and mushroom raviolis, paired with garlic bread and a bottle of local white wine. Usually our Friday nights consist of take-out Chinese and our couch, so this was a lovely change of pace. A great way to celebrate the start of the weekend. The only snafu occurred when B. went to make the garlic bread and realized that we hadn't cleaned out the oven yet. Thanks to the fire, it was still filled with burnt walnuts and a lot of fire extinguisher powder. But ever the quick thinker, B. enlisted the help of our vacuum and the oven was (basically) clean in no time.

Now we're headed to Rochester to meet with wedding photographers and see our good friends. Have a great weekend!

No fireworks, but we had the fire!

Yes, you read that correctly. B. and I did celebrate the 4th of July with some fire, just not the kind you would hope for. Instead of the fire in the sky, it was a fire in our oven.

B. is an excellent and very creative cook and was attempting to make us pork medallions with a soy sauce and orange juice glaze accompanied by a side of fresh green beans. While he was prepping all of his ingredients he came up with the idea to add crushed, roasted walnuts to the green beans. So he spread the crushed walnuts onto a cookie sheet and put them in the oven for a few minutes. We tested them about ten minutes later and the flavor was definitely richer, but they weren't quite as crunchy as we had thought they should be, so we decided to briefly broil them. (Cue ominous, foreshadowing music)

What I had forgotten (and what B. didn't realize would be the eventual downfall) was that he had sprinkled some brown sugar on the walnuts. So I'm in the living room and I hear a fairly casual "uh-oh." I go into the kitchen and ask what's wrong. "The nuts are on fire." Again, I'm thinking "fire" in that way where the little piece of food at the bottom of your oven catches on fire and burns out. Then he opens the door and FLAMES burst out!

This begins a very fast-talking coversation about strategy. B. tells me that his plan is to take the cookie sheet out, walk quickly across the kitchen and dump the flames and walnuts into the sink (which is already full of dishes). "What?! No! You're going to catch the kitchen on fire! Use the fire extinguisher." "No, that'll ruin the whole inside of the oven." These two basic trains of thought continue on and I begin to cave on my fire extinguisher stance a little when he opens the oven door again and the flames are much larger, much more violent, and are actually shooting out of the oven now!

But my darling engineer fiancee is still not convinced of the fire extinguisher idea! I quickly point out that the cookie sheet is the kind that has no edges and he has dumped entire meals off of the cookie sheet when it wasn't on fire. In addition, there is an entire garbage can of paper products in the way and the sink is full! Mind you, the kitchen is rapidly filling with smoke and there is no time for logic, now we're just panicking. "Use the fire extinguisher!! I'll clean the oven, you're going to burn the house down!"

So he did finally grab the little kitchen extinguisher and fire two short blasts into the oven and the fire was immediately out. Of course, the smell of the house is still not back to normal and may not be for quite some time, but the house is still here, so that's all that matters. And the inside of the oven is not nearly as bad as you might imagine, so that's a nice bonus.

We were very surprised to learn that two tiny blasts were enough for the extinguisher to register "empty," so there isn't quite as much room for air pressure in there as you would imagine. And B. did finally admit through a sheepish grin that the flames really had gotten out of hand and did need the extinguisher and not the sketchy "run to the full sink while jumping over the pile of paper" plan. So anyway, no fireworks for us, but B. did cook the meal (sans walnuts) about an hour later and it was absolutely amazing. Happy 4th!

Doctors - Real and Fake

This week was filled with doctors. Earlier in the week had some real doctors when I finally got an x-ray of my back. I hurt my back two years ago when I bent over to tie my shoe and inexplicably collapsed. I didn't have health insurance at the time, so I didn't do much about it. And then last July (wow - I just realized that it's been a full year!!), I got health insurance but also had a firm case of complacency. It sounds crazy, but I was just used to chronic pain. So I finally went to the doctor last week after not seeing one in about six years. Poor lady didn't know what hit her!! Bless her heart though, she hung with me through my list of ailments and didn't make me feel rushed at all.

As I suspected, she couldn't come to any firm conclusions about my back, but she did order an x-ray as a starting point to rule out a few things. As it turns out, the x-ray didn't show anything definitive, so I go back in six weeks for another appointment. Here I am in my patient outfit on my way to the x-ray machine...

Then last night is where the fake doctors come in. Our friend S. from the museum is having surgery in two weeks and since Saturday was her last night to drink, she and her boyfriend celebrated by throwing a Doctor and Nurse party. B. got some trusty scrubs from my mom and I put together a nurse outfit with anything white that I owned and a bunch of red electrical tape. Our outfits worked quite well, we'll definitely have to recycle them for a future Halloween.


The strange twist of irony that brings both types of doctors together is that we were late to the party because my back pain kicked into overdrive that afternoon and I had to lay on the couch for a few hours. But a long regimen of Advil, then some alcohol, then some IcyHot towards the end of the party made it so I was able to get through the night. See... who needs a real diagnosis when you have such a sophisticated method of pain control!