'Tis The Season For Giving.

Hello Friends!

Just wanted to type up a quick post about the Scott Firefighter Stairclimb (coming up in March) and the fundraising Steven is doing for it. Please start giving some thought to how much you think you would like to donate and remember that NO AMOUNT IS TOO SMALL! Honestly, if everyone who is asked to donate and doesn't plan to do so just gives $1, we will be thousands of dollars ahead of where we would be otherwise. Get creative with it! Steven will be climbing 69 flights of stairs, that's 1311 stairs, and 788 feet of vertical elevation and Steven's time last year was 17 minutes 49 seconds. So... you could donate $6.90 or $13.11 or $17.49 or even $131.10, makes it more fun that way, don't you think so?

Here's Steven's website so you can read a bit about his goals for this year and how he's making this experience more personal. http://www.llswa.org/site/TR/Events/General?px=1514008&pg=personal&fr_id=1220

A photo from last year's climb -- Steven passing another firefighter in the stairwell.

Thanks so much for reading and giving this some thought. We'll keep you updated on the exciting things Steven has going on with fundraising and training.

Happy giving,

Steph

Prepare To Be Amazed!

***no I'm not pregnant, don't even think that, you'll know when I am because the title of the post will probably just be "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" just wanted to clear that up real quick before you get to reading.***

Are you prepared. I have big news. Big. Huge. Huge news actually and it might come as a real shock to some of you. Ready? This might be hard to believe but I finally have a job. I do, it's true! I know you were starting to think it would never happen, I certainly was. It has been a very long time coming but in a way I feel like I finally "made it." Not really, I mean, it's no dream job but it is something that my resume will actually benefit from, so that's exciting. I'm going to leave out certain details when I blog about my job, including the actual name of the school I'm working at. I wouldn't want my blog posts to show up when people search for the school online or anything. I'm also going to try to be as positive about the job as possible on the blog which means that more often than not, you won't be getting the full story from just the blog :) As with most jobs, chances are, my reflections won't always be positive.

I am working at a private school in Bellevue. It's right off the freeway so it's convenient but I must say, it's one heck of a commute! Last night it took me nearly 2 hours to get home. Ugh. Anyhow, my first day was last Tuesday. I have a part time position as an office assistant during school hours (from 12:30 to 2:45) and as the after school program director during after-school hours (2:45-6:00). I've been doing a lot of data entry in the office. It's amazing how you can spend hours and hours on facebook and e-mail on a daily basis and not be at all bothered by it but after only an hour of data entry all of the sudden your eyes are tired and your back is sore. It's pretty silly. I've been liking it though because it's far less stressful than spending my entire work day learning how to do a new job. I can't really mess up data entry.

It's taken me a few days to learn the ropes of the after school program but I think I've finally got it down! Today went really smoothly. Basically I just manage the whole thing. Shuttle kids around from here to there, coordinate with the teachers, choose the worksheets and make photo copies, supervise indoor recess, listen to kids tattle, help parents find their kids, clean up and then complain a bit with my coworker before starting my drive home. I was a little bit bummed that the job is only part time and more than a little bit bummed that I didn't get hired as a teacher but I think this is really setting a good foundation for next year. I'm hoping I've significantly increased my chances of maybe having my very own classroom for 2012-2013! Wouldn't that be so cool?? Sigh, what a nice thought.

Oddly enough, I wasn't too excited after accepting the job. I was really excited during slash after the interview when I was offered the job but then I started to have mixed feelings about it. It felt like it was just too easy after all the failed attempts to get hired over the past couple of years. Then I started thinking about the schedule and how I wouldn't just be home to hang out with Steven on his days off and about all of the driving and all of the sudden I wasn't too keen on the idea of having a job. Haha! After all these months of complaining that I don't have one then I get one and I don't want it. That's just part of being an adult though, right? Fortunately, Steven was excited. He felt like it was a big deal and something that needed to be celebrated so celebrate we did.

We still had a Melting Pot gift card so Steven made a reservation and we went on a date a couple of weeks ago. It was an amazing experience, as always. The last two times we've gone there we've chosen to share one entree and we still leave feeling uncomfortably full. We decided this time that we definitely only need one salad to share instead of each getting our own. We chose the current Big Night Out menu. It was incredible! We had Boston Lager cheddar cheese fondue, and an entree plate that included shrimp and a lobster tail and then PB&J chocolate fondue for dessert. AND Steven made it really special by ordering the wine pairing flight for me and the beer pairing flight for himself! It was so much fun!!! It felt like a super fancy date and we just had the best time. We were so full afterwards though that we literally had to take the drive home in shifts. I'm not even joking. He took the first leg since I drank all of my wine and a good amount of his beer, and then he pulled over in Maple Valley and I drove the rest of the way so he could lean his seat back and just relax. It was an incredibly special evening.

Then last Thursday we had another big date night (totally unrelated to the first and not meant to be a celebration of the job). I surprised Steven with tickets to Cirque du Soleil's Micheal Jackson Immortal world tour. He had no idea, which made it that much more fun! I paid for cheap seats way in the back but there weren't that many people there so we were able to move way up before the show even started. We had a great view and the funny thing is, it seemed like everyone in our section had done the same thing. We overheard most of them talking about having moved up from their "cheap seats." Though I must say, they don't really sell a "cheap" seat to any Cirque du Soleil show. It was amazing! Completely different from any Cirque show we've seen but oh so much fun. Here's a very small taste of this phenomenal performance. It's an indescribable experience. I hope you get to go see it for yourself someday.

 

Steven has been wonderful about the whole new job thing. On my first day of work he surprised me with a super yummy dinner when I got home. He made salmon and rice and he was real sneaky about it too. That morning he told me that someone at the station wanted to know how I cooked my salmon. So I explained the process, he asked a few clarifying questions and that was that. Then on my way home Steven called and asked how to cook rice. He said he was thinking about making stir fry but I told him that probably wasn't a very good idea since the only vegetable we had was cabbage and maybe he should make potstickers instead. Then I came home and there was salmon in the toaster oven! Salmon is like our splurge dinner so it felt like a real treat and dinner was really tasty. Then last night I came home to a toasty house, glass of wine, mug of hot tea, and a pan of sloppy joe casserole fresh out of the oven. Isn't he the best?? I'm just so lucky.

It made me a little sad because I've always wanted to have dinner ready and the house smelling good when my husband comes home from work and I won't ever get to do that because he works 24 hour shifts and sometimes I'm still in bed when he gets home in the mornings. So it's really sweet that he's been making dinner for me but my heart breaks a little thinking about the fact that I won't ever be able to live out that little dream. It's one of the only "house-wife" type things I've ever been truly excited about. I'm planning to get up early tomorrow morning and make waffles before Steven gets home though. I hope that kind of feels special and fun and wifey. Guess that means I should stop typing and get to bed. Signing off. Goodnight!

Sugar & Spice.

It's that time of year again where everything just tastes better with a spoonful of sugar and a sprinkle of cinnamon :) I love it! I've been making all kinds of yummy things. I've made banana bread and cream cheese spritz cookies and chocolate chip cookies and I've been drinking loads of tea. My tea drinking habit has actually gotten a bit out of hand. In addition to my normal tea drinking (black tea with milk, peppermint tea, lemon tea with honey, green and white tea blend, Rooibos, coconut chai etc.) I've now started steeping tea in hot juice on a somewhat regular basis. Spiced hot cranberry juice is amazing (I suggest using chai) and earl grey works really well with hot apple juice. Speaking of earl grey, it's never been a favorite of mine but Whitney had tea at her house from Trader Joe's called Duchess Grey. It is similar to earl grey but very delicate and citrusy and much yummier than normal earl grey.

Grammi and I made pumpkin cookies over Halloween weekend. They don't have pumpkin in them, they're sugar cookies decorated to look like pumpkins. She makes them every year. I've never helped before but she wasn't going to make them this year so I had to help if I wanted to make sure I was going to get my pumpkin cookies. I need a bit more practice at it. I accidentally put the icing on too thick so then when Grammi put the faces on some of the chocolate chips were sliding off. These pumpkins had some pretty interesting facial expressions. They were certainly yummy though. I brought my Halloween cat cookie cutter and we made of few of those too. I used green icing on one of the cats and brought it home especially for Tara.

Isn't this apple perfect? I love it. Lena brought it home from Yakima. In fact, she brought loads and loads of them home from Yakima. So when we got together last week we spent a good 45 minutes looking up apple recipes online. We settled on an apple coffee cake and apple butter.

Pretty cute little cooking area for such a tiny kitchen :)

The apple butter experience was a really fun one. It was super easy to make and really quite tasty. I think it would be fun to make for gifts over the holidays. I just have to do a little research about how long it will keep and things like that. Here's the Apple Butter recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/gale-gand/allspiced-apple-butter-recipe/index.html and here's the coffee cake recipe we used. It's pretty darn good but skip the glaze -- it's just not necessary. http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/apple-coffee-cake-with-crumble-topping-and-brown-sugar-glaze-recipe/index.html.

I'm looking forward to lots more baking in the chilly months to come. This year I want to try out some cold weather drinks too. I plan to make homemade apple cider and figure out what the hot buttered rum thing is all about. AND I found a recipe for homemade Irish cream that I'm pretty excited about. Mmmm... sounds like fun.

Off To Massachusetts.

Well check this out, I'm finally getting around to blogging about Boston. If you've been waiting, I apologize for the delay. If you haven't, well, then it doesn't really matter, does it? We returned home from Boston about a week and a half ago but between Steven's work schedule and some work I/we have been doing for my dad and my never ending illness, my blog has just been completely neglected. Ah, and not to worry, I think I'm almost healthy. Today marks 7 weeks of sniffling slash coughing (and at times even worse than that) but it also marks the last day of round 2 of antibiotics and the first time I've slept through the night without NyQuil or incessant coughing. Praise Jesus. But that's not what you came to hear about, is it? No, of course not. Then off to Massachusetts we shall go!

On Friday October 21st Steven and I took a red eye flight to Boston to visit Chad and Whitney. Let's chat about this plane ride. I need to give you some frequent flyer tips. First of all, don't sit in row 12 on a 737. This is the row in front of the emergency exit and the seats do not recline. This normally wouldn't bother me but in the middle of the night, it does. Secondly, if you sit in rows 6 through 14, you will board last. This doesn't really bother me either but there are two slightly inconvenient facts to consider in this situation. 1) it is kind of really nice to just get on first, get out of the way and get settled because other people are just so darn slow. 2) if you get on last and there isn't any room left for your bag to go in the over-head compartment, they'll check your bag for you. They don't charge you, so that's nice, but if you intentionally packed light so that you wouldn't have to wait for checked baggage after your flight, this can be a bit of a bummer. Fortunately, we didn't have this problem, it's just something you might want to consider. Most importantly, unless if you're a really good plane sleeper, just don't take a red eye. Flying through the night makes for the longest flight ever. I like the concept -- better to fly by night so you have more actual awake time at the place you're traveling to -- but I just think it's a bit too miserable to be worth it. We plan to have a DVD player (or smallish laptop) for future trips to make this more bearable. Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep.

We arrived Saturday morning at 6:30am positively loopy. Steven and I are always a bit silly but I'd say this was somewhat extreme. Whitney was kind enough to pick us up (I felt terrible getting her up so early on a Saturday) while Chad was back at the apartment preparing breakfast. Chad and Whit gave us the 2 second tour (very cute place they have there -- so well put together. I love their new mirror over the couch. I think it's my favorite part) and then I promptly made a cup of tea and jumped in the shower. We had an incredible breakfast together (yummy frittata made by Chad: it had zucchini and bowtie pasta and sausage, and lemon, cranberry, ginger scones made by Whitney, also delicious) and then it was off to walk the streets of Boston.

We started out on the Freedom Trail where we saw pretty much everything. Boston Common, Old North Church, The State House (where the Declaration of Independance was read), Paul Revere's House, the old City Hall, the new City Hall, 53 Dunkin Donut Shops, 3 Starbucks shops and probably lots of other stuff I don't really remember but it was all pretty darn cool.

Honestly, I think my favorite part of the Freedom Trail might have been the Holocaust Memorial. Oh my goodness. It was incredibly moving. Each tower represents one of the 6 death camps. I wish I had taken a better picture but these glass towers are covered with the numbers assigned to the people in the camps. It's somewhat horrifying to allow the reality of the truly human identity of each of those numbers to begin to really resonate with you. Hmm... wow. There really isn't anything to say. I will never understand how truly horrifying it all really was and I am selfishly quite glad for that.

This is a beautiful memorial. When you go to Boston you should seek it out.

Our walk continued into the North End through the Italian District where we stopped in a little pastry shop and bought cannoli. Yum! I don't think I've ever had a real cannoli, just the gigantic chocolate chip ones at Claim Jumper, but the sweet ricotta cheese that filled this cannoli was fabulous. I want one right now but I really love sharing treats with Steven and he's at work so I guess now really isn't a good time anyway.

After a quick rest we were off to walk the streets of the lovely Beacon Hill neighborhood. These homes are so beautiful! I wish we could have seen the insides. They look really posh.

Couple photos in the Public Gardens :)

By mid-afternoon Steven and I were pretty much exhausted so we made our way back to the apartment and spent the afternoon playing games. Whitney and I let the boys play Halo for a few minutes while we got a small snack together and then we all played Castle Panic. Then it was over to Harvard for a lovely walk and margaritas and quesadillas at the Border Cafe for dinner. What a great first day! Steven and I slept very well that night. Phew! That day felt long the first time I lived it and having just relived it, I'd have to say that's because it was a very, very long day. But a fun one for sure.

Day two! Sunday. We were lucky enough to get to go to church with Chad and Whitney. They attend Highrock Church in Brookline and I really enjoyed it. I haven't been to a small church in a long time and there was something truly lovely about it. Whitney runs the coffee/tea table and everyone brings their own mug. I really liked walking in to church with a mug and drinking tea. It felt cozy and comfortable right from the start. Everyone was friendly and the worship was good. It was nice to actually be able to hear people singing. I guess I've gotten somewhat used to Eastlake where we worship in the dark with crazy loud music so that no one feels uncomfortable. For someone like me who is totally comfortable with worship, it was nice to hear people worshipping around me and with me. It sounds really silly (and I feel kind of weird writing about it) but one of my favorite parts of worship has always been towards the end of a song when the band stops playing and everyone carries on singing acapella. I love it. I love hearing so many people singing together like that. Wow, sorry, anyhow, the message was good, the people were super friendly, and Chad and Whitney's friends sat behind us and their friend Kim had her parents with her from Vancouver and her dad's name is Cyril, which I think is an adorable name, and I just had a great time. Then after service they have Soul Food. Everyone from the church just hangs out and eats lunch together. It's pretty cool and such a great opportunity for fellowship. Very unique. I've never seen anything like it and I loved it.


We spent the second half of the day in Cape Ann (bit more of the good touristy type info about Cape Ann and some nice sunny photos from Chad and Whit's blog last year if you're interested http://mayerstravels.blogspot.com/2010/04/cape-ann.html ).

We walked around the cute little town of Rockport and stopped in a little coffee shop for hot chocolate. It was a bit chilly but the clouds made for some really fun photos.

Next stop was the Russell Orchard. Evidently, it's quite popular in New England to go to orchards to pick apples in the fall. Like going to a pumpkin patch. In fact, most of the orchards also have pumpkin patches and corn mazes. It's the whole fall experience all in one. Chad and Whit had already done the whole apple-picking bit and we didn't feel any great need to get in on that fun so we just stopped and enjoyed the farm for a while.




We ate fresh cider doughnuts and bought apples and even took part in an impromptu wine tasting. They had blackberry wine (my favorite of the ones we tried) and a "hard cider" that really didn't taste all that cidery to me. They also had a bunch of different ones that weren't open for tasting but that I thought sounded interesting. Like dandelion and elderberry wine. Feeling like we had gotten the most out of our Gloucester orchard experience, we drove a short ways away to what seems to be the pride and joy of Ipswich: The Clam Box. We waited a full 45 minutes (most of that time spent in a line outside) before sitting down to two huge piles of fried calamari and clams. We were so ready to eat that I completely forgot to take pictures of the two glorious mountains of fried seafood that we quickly devoured. It took lots of ketchup and (on Chad's part) lots of tartar sauce, but we managed to finish it all off. Oiy. I was so full. The drive back into the city was beautiful and we were all grateful that dinner wouldn't be ready for quite a few hours.

As for the rest of the evening... wine, a few rounds of 500, more wine, a game of Smallworld (Whitney and I kicked butt each taking one victory), an amazing roast chicken and potato dinner at 9:45pm -- haha!, and  then Halo for the boys and Just Go With It for the girls. Terrible film by the way. Don't watch it. We didn't think it would be great but we figured that with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston it would at least be funny. Definitely not as funny as we would have liked.

Day 3! We had a nice slow morning. Chad left early for work and Whitney went out for a walk but came back to hang out with us. We were so glad that she had the day off work! We spent a couple of hours at Goodwill and the party store helping Whitney get her Halloween costumes together :) Then we packed a picnic lunch and went to pick Chad up from school.

This is the view from Chad's building. Crazy huh? But what was really crazy was the conversation we heard in the elevator on the way up: "We've got a really good cadaver. She's not too fat or anything so her organs are really accessible." Oh. My. Goodness. Then they were talking about sawing things. Yuck. I can't believe that's so normal for them to talk about. God did not call me into the field of medicine. This I know for sure.

Here's something really fun about Boston -- they have breweries with free tastings. I'm sure we have those in Seattle as well but I don't know about them. The first one we visited was Harpoon. They had an hour long tasting where we had the opportunity to try the 12 different beers that they had on tap. Steven and I both really enjoyed listening to how the different beers are made and learning about how/why they all taste different. We figured out we're not so into the hoppy ones. Nope. Steven really liked the raspberry. I actually wasn't too fond of any of them... maybe that's why I got to drive afterwards. Ha! The driving in Boston is really kind of scary and there are people double-parked everywhere and people walk where ever they like all the time even when the car has the green light but I decided I could probably manage it. I like driving in new places. It makes me feel more confident about my ability to travel and navigate new cities. It really wasn't all that scary once I was doing it. I drove us to Doyle's where we shared a huge cheese pizza for our "snack." It was really kind of like a first dinner but that's okay. You're supposed to eat a lot on vacation right? After our snack we went to the Arboretum for a quick walk up Peters Hill. It was so nice to be outside! The trees were pretty and we had a lovely view of the city from the top.

Back at the apartment... well, bet you can't guess how we spent the rest of our evening. Games you say? Oh, I suppose you can guess then. Yeah, it's true, we played games and drank more wine and Chad made black bean burgers on ciabatta bread and they were incredible. I want to make them but I didn't ask for the recipe. There's a similar one in one of my cookbooks. I'll have to try it sometime.

Day 4! Steven and I chose not to adjust to the Boston schedule. We stayed up late and slept in late (staying almost on Seattle times, off by maybe an hour) and I think it probably worked for the best. By Tuesday morning we were feeling a bit more rested but I must admit, I was missing my NyQuil. Chad had to work Tuesday morning and Whitney (after making us some really tasty waffles) needed a few hours to study so Steven and I made the most of the sunshine and took a walk through the Brookline neighborhood. We walked through the residential area and stopped at John F. Kennedy's house (sadly the little museum is closed on Tuesdays, we were looking forward to the free visit) and then made our way to the high street. We walked for a bit and stopped in the Ten Thousand Villages store. They have so much cool stuff. I could buy some really great Christmas gifts in there. I'll have to find one near us.

On the way back to the apartment I managed to find the Clear Flour Bread Bakery that Whitney and I had walked to on our first day. I wanted to share a cookie but I knew the moment that Steven saw the focaccia that there was just no way we were going to walk out of there without it. So, sadly, no cookie, but the focaccia was most excellent. We wished we had bought two.

Tuesday afternoon we visited the Samuel Adams Brewery. They have a tour with a free tasting afterwards. We got to try their Boston Lager, Oktoberfest and Pumpkin Ale. They were all pretty good. We decided we had to go back to Doyle's afterwards. They were the first restaurant to have Samuel Adams on tap and they have a deal where if you come in with your hand stamp after doing the tour of the brewery and order a Sam Adams beer then you get a free glass. These glasses are super special I guess (mostly we just think they look cool). They have all of these unique design features created especially for drinking Samuel Adams. I can't explain it all to you. You'd just have to look it up (though after this novel of a blog entry I highly doubt you have the energy for that right now). I chose the hard cider. De-lish! It was a really good cider. Sweet but no too sugary sweet. And now we all have fun new glasses.

Whitney had a test in her nutrition class that night so I went back to the apartment with the boys for tacos and games. I even let them play Halo for a little while. When Whitney got back it was games for the four of us and then more Halo for the boys. We were up way too late.

And Wednesday morning we were up way too early. Chad woke up to see us off and Whitney kindly drove us to the airport. The flight home was far less painful than the flight over. I love coming home. Flying in to Seattle is just beautiful and makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Unfortunately, by this point in time my head was totally congested again and the pressure during landing was bad news. Ouch. Steven and I spent the day on the couch watching movies and fell asleep (with the help of NyQuil though I can't say we needed too much help) around 8 or 8:30. It was hard to stay up that late but we did it. I stayed in bed the next morning when Steven got up for work and I think I ended up sleeping a total of 13 hours. We have both managed to catch up on our sleep since then.

What a great time we had in Boston!! Can't believe it took us two years to get out there for a visit and hopefully it isn't the last visit since Chad and Whit still have a few more years there. We're looking forward to seeing them very soon when they come home for Christmas!

Are you still reading? Really? Wow, well done. You made it! Thanks for sticking it out. Look to facebook for more photos. It's always hard to choose just a few for the blog :)
Happy Bonfire Night by the way.

Much love,
Steph