Thanksgiving The First

OK. We do Thanksgiving twice. Once with Geoff's family and once with mine. I have to say I'm not much in a blogging mood today (busy at work, busy planning a baby shower and things on my mind). However....I had a really good time with Geoff's family on Thanksgiving, so I can't not share pictures.

There was a ton of hustle and bustle. My sister-in-law's family is big and there were extra cousins there this time, so I bet there were about 25-30 folks in attendance. Very different from my small immediate family version we would do the next day. But just as fun. And as I stood at the kitchen island making the Buffalo Chopped Chicken Salad (yes, the CPK version), I found myself really enjoying all the hustle and bustle and activity going on around me. Kids running everywhere, a dog parked by the turkey carving station, people talking, and rushing about as the timing of all the dishes reached their respective critical moments. I just liked it. It made me smile on the inside.

It might not have hurt that I was making my salad right next to my own contribution to the day:


Being within arms reach of a cheese plate always does wonders for my mood. Particularly if there is a horseradish cheese involved. And there was. *sigh* Joy.

After the meal, there were outdoor games for the kids. Lots of relay races which involved carrying various vegetables in spoons.


Maya giving me a little sass after one of her runs with a turnip in a slotted spoon.


And eventually, there was an egg toss. Hard boiled for the kids. And also for the adults to practice on. A brave few moved on to real eggs a little later.

Maya waiting for the egg toss with Uncle Geoff. SO PRECIOUS....the hand holding.


Oops!


Quinn (Liz's brother's son) hanging out with Grampy (Liz's dad - obviously)


I love this shot. Even though its blurry and completely more "spring" than "fall". I just like it. So there.


Kayla, getting into some mischief...


And possibly my favorite shot of the day...the cutest butt in all of Thanksgiving.


And then we hopped in the car and headed for Thanksgiving Part Two...

A Nightstand Speak Volumes (Get it? Volumes?)

These are the books on my nightstand. I think it could be argued that they say a lot about me. Lets look....

1. Two copies of Real Simple, which I just love.

2. That journal there is a dream journal that a friend gave me in college after I regaled him with all the bizarre dreams I have...involving Pippi Longstocking, Laura Ingalls Wilder, band practice in an old red barn (that I was leading, somehow, even though I only have ever played piano), A Midsummer Night's Dream and magic balloons (and that was all in one dream). I don't write in as often as I used to, but I keep it there just in case.

3. Girl Meets God is memoir about a girl who was grew up with a Baptist mother and Jewish father, embraced Judaism in college and was drawn to Christianity as a young adult. An interesting journey of faith. I'm only halfway through.

4. Wild Decembers is fiction...a story about love and feuding families in Ireland. A little romance and a little drama. Love it. I'm only one chapter in, so we'll see how it goes.

5. Errol Flynn, The Untold Story speaks to my love of biographies of people from old Hollywood. I've read Katherine Hepburn's, Lauren Bacall's, Moss Hart's and Eli Wallach's biographies to name a few. Apparently (though I'm not that far into it yet, Errol Flynn was actually a Nazi spy. I had no idea.)

So to review, from this we can learn that I am interested in:
1. Things related to making my life simpler (in fashion, beauty, cooking, organization, life). TRUE.
2. Journaling and dreams. TRUE.
3. Journeys of faith (especially those that are unconventional). TRUE.
4. Good stories, romance and drama. TRUE (and on a daily basis please)
5. History and lives of interesting people who have gone before me. TRUE.

And apparently I'm also interested in not finishing one book before I begin another.


In contrast, what's on Geoff's beside table you may ask?...

Politics
Religion
Finances
Business


Puke.
(OK, puke except for the religion part, 'cause I guess I've got some of that too).

Very very different themes. But that's us. But with a little bit of crossover. And I'm glad he can read all about the stuff that would put me right to sleep. I guess someone should.

But my personal favorite on his bedside table...? A tiny little blue volume called "Don'ts for Husbands". I got it for him as a joke last year. Written by a woman in the 1800s I think. Love that he keeps it on his nightstand. Can't promise he's read any of it of his own volition. But then again, he's doing just fine without it.

And that ends today's self-reflection. We're headed to see family for the holidays. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

In Hopes of Convincing Mark and Others Like Him...

The other week I met Mark. A musician friend of Alison's from the Fiddler tour. We had a lovely dinner before the three of us went our separate ways to the theatre. And by lovely, I mean, overpriced, poor service and the spilling of Alison's margarita all over the table and having to rustle up our own paper towels to clean it up. So the only thing good I guess, was the company.

However, to my shock and disbelief, Mark shared something truly unbelieveable with me. He DOES NOT LIKE RAW TOMATOES. DOES. NOT. I cannot relate to this at all. I get extra tomatoes on everything they will let me get extra tomatoes on. Oddly, he does like roasted tomatoes. Which I also can't relate to, as the texture of roasted tomatoes kind of skeeves me out.

So in hopes of convincing him of the wonders of tomatoes and the error of his ways, I offer this...


He's never tried them with salt and pepper. Which is just shocking and wrong. And makes me concerned for what else he missed out on in his childhood. Don't they look lovely, Mark? A little salt & pepper and a little basil from my windowsill garden. How can you resist? No, seriously. HOW CAN YOU RESIST??!?!?

And just in case it helps....they are lovely with a little club soda and lime. Or club soda, lime and a heaping helping of vodka if that gets you through it. It will be worth it. I promise.

What I Did This Weekend, or, Productivity, Thy Name is Me

The above picture is for Robert Norman, who wondered in a comment how I could manage to stop and take pictures while cooking. This is just a glimpse of the mess that explodes in my kitchen when I attempt to make something. I wouldn't want him (or any of you) to think that I am not completely in a tizzy, and barely able to form full sentences while cooking and taking pictures of cooking. Perhaps you missed the post last week when I talked about throwing things in a crock pot while running around in my bathrobe, hair a mess and fully talking to myself like the crazy lady who hangs out by the McDonalds on 40th & &7th Ave. Make no mistake, I am no domestic goddess. And if there are pictures of my cooking adventures, it probably is at the expense of the meal I'm trying to make.

There, I feel better. Good to have that out in the open. Moving on...

We did a ton this weekend. And I enjoyed it all. There was cooking, bike rides, movies, walks, cleaning & organizing and good discussions. Let me give you the blow by blow.

FRIDAY NIGHT
I went grocery shopping after work and lugged home food to make for the weekend. But was too tired to cook so we ordered fajitas from our favorite Mexican place in our neighborhood. Best salsa in 3 counties. (I just made that up, but feel that it is true.)

SATURDAY
First there was breakfast. Most important meal of the day. Coffee for me, OJ & iced tea for Geoff. And I made him this.


And opted for a tomato & Parmesan reggiano omelet for myself.


After breakfast we had a long chat on the couch...business ideas & planning and a little business related internet research. Then we retired to The Cabana. Which is what I call our bedroom. It's always so sunny in there because of our corner of windows. So we chatted some more and enjoyed all the sunshine and then I threw some things in the crock pot to make Ginger Beef Stew.



While the crock pot did its work, we walked over to the movie theatre to see The Blind Side. It's such a great story, but we felt like the film fell just shy of what it could have been. I still basically enjoyed it though.

We came home to a pretty decent ginger beef stew. I would link the recipe except I can't for the life of me remember where I found it. (And apparently it doesn't hold up well a couple days later, as Geoff said today that it was starting to remind him of cat food. So. Not the highest of recommendations. And sorry for the gross mental picture I just gave you.) Once again our grocery store didn't have the kind of beef the recipe required, and I think that ultimately that was the problem, but it was still fairly decent the day we made it. Served over brown rice with steamed broccoli...


We attempted to watch a Jane Austen movie, (Pursuasion) but it put Geoff to sleep pretty quickly, so even though I maintain that he started falling asleep just when things were starting to happen, we gave up trying and just went to bed, as we are old and lame. Maybe we'll try again sometime...

SUNDAY
After breakfast, and some Real Simple reading for me, I got a little fussy. Sometimes I do and don't know why. Yes, I know what you're thinking...very similar to a toddler. But Geoff calmed me down and we set out for the rest of the day.

There was bike riding. And for the most part, I confined myself to only taking pictures without looking through the viewfinder.....just aiming the camera in the general direction of things as it hung over my shoulder & around my neck. Got some interesting things actually....

The church a few blocks from our house


This guy I liked a lot


I know it seems like we live in the middle of an industrial park, but we don't. We just have created a bike route for ourselves through one. Not a ton of traffic that way...


We ended up back in Long Island City. Where there was lunch. And Sangria.


The wall by our table. I just liked it.


My camera's view as it hung from my neck while I was riding


Anyone need an apartment? A computer? A new church...?


I'm obsessed with these big barn doors. If I ever take headshots or album cover shots or any kind of shots, I'm going there. I love them.


Heading up one of the hills on the way home


And let me share with you a little tip I learned this weekend...biking up hill Post-Sangria is not the easiest or most advisable way to do it. Just in cast you thought it was...

Then it was back home where I organized The 4th Wall in my living room, which has been an eyesore for ages. It's one of those places that just really accumulates things. And the furniture doesn't match the rest of the room. But that's another post entirely...more on that later. I organized it a bit though and that at least felt like progress.

We had a slight casualty when Geoff was working with some steel wool and sliced his finger right open. Definitely sprayed blood on the walls, but that came right off, no problem, so once he was appropriately bandaged, we moved along to the fun stuff, and might I add, the most important element of any cooking scenario...


Clearly. And while he nursed his wound, I started on dinner.


I made Beef and Bean Chili Verde.


Really easy and REALLY good. Wish I'd made more of it to last us through the week with leftovers. It was YUM.


Also, let me just apologize for the very cooking-focused blogging that has been happening recently. I would like to think that I do and think about other things as well, but....this has been what I've been up to. So.... there you have it. But there will be other non-food related things to come. Hang in there.

Oh, PS.....there was one thing that I didn't make, but wanted to:


Chunks of banana rolled in cocoa powder and then in coconut. Relatively healthy, especially if you get real cocoa instead of this chocolate + cocoa combo that's bound to be a bit sweeter. And they didn't have unsweetened coconut (ah, teeny NYC grocery stores), so I had to get the sweetened kind. A fun idea though. I'll let you know how it is....

Fridays are for Laughing

This one is for Mom....as a reminder of what I used to do every morning when I woke up...



And this one has been making us laugh this week. Which sometimes you just need.



And this is what might happen to me tonight if I move on to a second glass of wine...



Happy Friday!

Minimalism on Display

I was wondering when we'd venture into Thanksgiving decorations at our building. I mean, given all the other special celebratory displays we've seen thus far, I was interested to see what kinds of treasures would come out of the woodwork. Pilgrims? Cornucopias? Various vegetables from the squash family? I was hoping for Cornucopias at a minimum. Well, either Frank & Ifan (our Building Manager & Super) have been reading my blog and have taken my mocking to heart, or they just were going for something a bit more subtle. Something a little simpler. Classier. Perhaps they are realizing that less is more.


Now, this is Queens minimilism at its finest. They really paired it down. Just Tom the Pilgrim Turkey and that tiny little poster on the front door. And they even killed two birds with one stone with this "He's a turkey AND a Pilgrim" combination. Well, it is a recession after all. Times is hard.

However, I do think Tom's general size, color and crazy cartoon bug eyes does put us just out of being labeled as "classy design asthetic". But perhaps it is at least a step in the right direction. Things may be looking up.

Though I bet you anything I will be eating my words come Christmas....

Update

i just busted out some pushups.


just fyi


maybe there is hope for these sad arms yet.

A Bowling Wedding Party

Last month we ventured out to celebrate the marriage of my friend Nadia. She & Aaron got married in September out of town but had a Black Tie Bowling Party for their NYC friends who couldn't make it all the way out there. Now, here's what I will say about bowling. I always say I hate it. But then once I'm there, I always have a good time. And we did.

Here's what I will also say. I took none of these pictures. Nadia is a crazy talented Renaissance woman who is a singer, actress, songwriter, comedienne, photographer & feathered hair clip designer. (Which, incidentally, could be really great Christmas gifts for the girly girls in your life....if you're in need of ideas.) These pictures I swiped from her Facebook page.

Since a bowling wedding party is delightfully trashy in concept, Nadia found a delightfully trashy dress. I thought it was perfect. (And you'll notice one of her feather clips in her hair - they are awesome).


We got pretty serious with our bowling names...(that's us on the left, my co-workers on the right)


Me, unable to hide a lack of seriousness I have about my push ups, which have woefully fallen by the wayside. Clearly. I post this in hopes it will motivate me to get back on the wagon. But I am absolutely serious about BOWLING in this picture. Which is something at least. And I may also be trash-talking to whoever is on my left. I definitely hope I am.


Me with the new Mrs. Quinn (and I'm loving the standard bowling alley wood panneling in the background)


The stunning new couple. Seriously, don't they look like they are right out of an magazine ad? I don't think people should be allowed to be so photogenic. It's a little excessive...


Congratulations to the new couple!

I Can Cook Too (sort of)

We've turned over a new leaf. Or are trying to. Even though I'm barely ever home before 10pm on weeknights, I want to be better about cooking. Honestly, there's not a ton of time in my life for it right now. But I do enjoy it. And want to get better at it. For the future. The Alleged Future. When I have Time. (I secretly do wonder if that does actually exist. But I try to hope nonetheless.)

So lets be honest. Anything I cook for dinner basically has to A) happen inside of 20 minutes, B) not involve cooking meat on the stovetop (since our apartment stove has no exhaust hood and I therefore live in fear that the NYFD could show up at any given moment should I attempt to grill a little chicken) or C) take place inside a crockpot. I do dream of ultimately being fancy like Stephen or Alison, but until I have Time and a complete set of kitchen tools, I'll be hauling out the slow cooker. And therefore yes, this will basically be the second blog post in a row that involves or at least mentions a crockpot.

With Geoff being an Asian food fan, I decided to branch out and try some Spicy Peanut Chicken. I sauteed some onions, carrots & celery in a frying pan. Then I diced up some ginger, black peppercorns and garlic.


I felt a little fancy adding it to the veggies. Cause it just looked cool. And it involved ginger. So it made me seem interesting and exotic. Even though, in reality I was frantically trying to get this done before heading out the door to teach a class, and was still in my bathrobe & glasses with Crazy Hair and was very likely talking to myself. But yes, absolutely....using fresh ginger made me exotic and fabulous.


I sliced some chicken and put it in the crockpot, topped it with the veggie mixture and let the Magic Pot do all the work. (5.5 hours on low or 2 hours on high)


After I got back from class (in which I had a teenage hopeful tell me that I was the first casting director she'd ever met who seemed like a real person. Instead of some mean old troll out to ruin her life, I guess.) I had one more step. I mixed all natural (no salt added) peanut butter with lemon juice, soy sauce & Thai red curry paste in a bowl, chopped up 2 red peppers and threw all of that plus some sweat peas and a cup of coconut milk into the crockpot and let it cook for another 20 minutes on high.


And then, we were done.... We had it over rice and topped with fresh cilantro and roasted peanuts.


It was good! And I was proud of myself for branching out from my usual "chili" options. I'd added some extra chicken so it would last us a bit longer into the week, but of course, I didn't actually do proper math to get all the proportions right. So we ended up adding an extra splash of soy sauce at the table and that really brought the flavors out. And surprisingly, I am not usually a fan of peas or plain peanuts (give me an almond, pine nut, walnut or any other kind of nut any day), but they were both really good additions.

Now here's my only question. The recipie had called for bone in chicken thighs but I could not find any at the grocery store so I just bought regular chicken breasts. And the consistency of the chicken that I ended up with was....the only drawback of the meal. Geoff thinks maybe we need to marinate it first? I wonder if chicken breasts are easier to overcook in a crockpot than dark meat. That would make sense i guess. But any thoughts? Anyone have any ideas how to make the chicken moist and flavorful instead of slightly reminiscent of the texture of...gum that you've chewed too long?

Shocked & Appalled

That's what I am.


Horrified.


That basically none of you have commented on how amazing and/or adorable Charlie the Bulldog was in my last post.


Shocked.


Appalled.


Are you perhaps all dead inside?


It's unfortunate, but I may be forced to never forgive you.


I hope you can live with yourselves.


xoxo

Sundays are my Favorite

I love Sundays. It usually means brunch. And time with Geoff. And a slow pace. This Sunday we got up and I threw some ingredients in the crockpot for chili chicken stew and we headed out on our bikes. We spent most of the day in Long Island City and the weather was gorgeous. We dropped my bike off for a tune-up and to get a new kickstand and went to brunch at Masso. Geoff had the Crab Cakes Eggs Benedict and I had their Green Eggs & Ham (a pesto, goat cheese & prosciutto scramble. YUM.)

And Then.

Then we saw Charlie.


He was having brunch outside with his mom and dad. And I spent most of brunch taking his picture.


He sees me! He loves me too!


I mean. COME ON. Can you even stand it??


Then we headed over to the river to sit and chat and do some people watching. The weather was awesome.


Fun People Watching






Couldn't decide which of these two I liked more. So I give you both.



Even the seagulls were digging the day. And the view.


I was pretending in my head that I was shooting this couple's engagement shoot. Even though they didn't even know it. And probably aren't even engaged. It was still fun.






Loved this kid. He was having the best time.


Somersaults in the sunshine....I mean, what is better than that?


LO-OVED this kid. Look at the face. He's my boyfriend.


Except looks like he already has a lady friend. He picked this grass to give to her.


Look how they are all Romeo & Juliet, being torn apart by their families.


All in all, a lovely lovely day at the River. As lovely as the East River can be anyway. We had a lovely talk and laid in the grass for a bit as the sun started to sink behind Manhattan.


And then we headed home on our bikes where there was Chili Chicken Stew just waiting for us. I mean, that's my kind of day.